Thierry Gontier, a statistician who worked in many countries on disability issues, spent many years in Honduras working in the field of disability. While in Honduras, Mr. Gontier was contracted to work with the national statistical institute (INE) to analyse the results of a large survey conducted with a disability module in 2001. In a discussion with Mr. Gontier about his experience, he explains how this project developed and what the significance of obtaining disability data was for Honduras.

Why did the government initiate the survey?
Importance of having disability data was identified by civil society in Honduras. When drafting the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper in 2000, civil society pointed to the need for the creation of a national information system for persons with disabilities and to incorporate a module on disability within surveys produced by the National Statistical Institute on various aspects in order to identify among other things geographical location, socioeconomic and demographic characteristics of the population with disabilities.
In addition, there was a large consensus between the disability sector and the team in charge of the poverty reduction strategy as they both felt that collecting data in order to design appropriate programmes to fight discrimination made sense. Therefore, in 2001, the government did not have any objection to conducting a survey with a disability module.

How was the project carried out?
The first phase of the project was initiated by Handicap International in 2001 with UK Department for International Development (DFID). The first phase was the identification of the way to produce data on disability which included the design of a disability module with the participation of DPOs and relevant line ministries. Then, the survey itself had a sample of 13,000 households selected randomly and was carried out by INE within its regular budget.
By the time HI withdrew from Honduras at the end of 2001, the analysis of the results had not yet been completed. However, in 2002, Mr. Gontier was contracted by INE as a consultant to conduct the analysis of the survey results.

What are the main findings from the survey?
The answer to this question depends mainly on the end user of the information: for example, the Ministry of Health, it was enlightening for them to discover that 3 of 4 parents of a child with a congenital disability under 2 years of age have not yet detected the disability and cannot take appropriate measure when its time to reverse or limit the impairment. As a result of this finding, the development of an early detection program was a priority for the Ministry of Health.
For the Ministry of Education, they could not reach their international commitments of universal access to primary education without addressing the problem that the majority of children with disabilities were not completing primary school. In addition, the survey showed that the few children with disabilities enrolling in school having access to education do not have the specific attention they need and have lower rates of progression from their classmates without disabilities.
For the Ministry of Labour, the fact that the public sector was more discriminatory towards hiring people with disabilities than the private sector was important information. In addition, the high rates of employment of people with disabilities in the informal sector were also revealing for this ministry.
Probably the most significant results showed the link between poverty and disability in Honduras was strong. For example, the probability to become disabled is 3 times higher in poor household than in rich ones. The survey also showed the marginalization people with disabilities face through the lack of access to mainstream services such as education and health and the survey confirmed the limited coverage of specialised services.
By comparing the results of the survey with the public budget it was easy to demonstrate that the existing public policies and social expenses were not reducing the discrimination between people with disabilities and the rest of the population. In fact, the data showed that more public money is spent on non-disabled persons than on people with disabilities.

What did stakeholders do with the information once it was completed?
DPOs have seen that having official data that shows clear direct or indirect discrimination between people with and without disabilities was a powerful tool to defend their rights.
After having a presentation of the results of the survey, the Ministry of Education has begun to address the problem of access to education for children with disabilities. They have created a specific department to tackle the issue and have begun defining a policy. In the design of the policy, the ministry used detailed findings from the survey such as how household characteristics and demographics impact access to education. The survey also showed that attitudinal barriers in the family have a greater impact on access to education than the attitude of the teachers of physical accessibility of the premises. Finally, the data from the survey was also used to establish a baseline and provide an indicator for monitoring the policy.
In addition, international agencies such as UNDP and UNICEF made great use of this information in their reports in the design of their country programmes.
The development of these statistics is critical for guiding the development of disability policies and can serve as indicators for monitoring their implementation. However, it is vital that local DPOs are involved and aware of the development of such surveys so that they have a certain level of ownership on the data and are therefore, committed to using the results for lobbying.