Wheelchairs for Mindanao

Implementing Partner: Handicap International

Funding Period: October 2008 - September 2010

Amount: $626,750

Purpose: Support the integration of persons with disability into the socioeconomic life of their community by improving their mobility and providing them with access to development opportunities.

Objective: The program is working to set up an autonomous, sustainable entity that can provide adapted wheelchairs and related services to people with disabilties. The program works to improve the monthly produciton, distribution, and autonomy of this entity.

USAID’s project in the Philippines is implemented by Handicap International. Its main features include a wheelchair production center, the Freedom Technology Center, on the southern island of Mindanao. There, the project produces wheelchairs custom-fit for the user’s disability, as well as for the environment in which the chair will be used. Chairs produced at the center are also distributed through a network of project-established distribution units that bring necessary services to persons with disabilities in outlying regions. Included in the services provided by these units is training for the families of wheelchair users in how to provide daily assistance and adapt the living environment for the wheelchair user.

Prior to the establishment of this production center, an in-depth business analysis was conducted and a solid business plan produced. As a result, the center is well on its way to financial sustainability as well.

In addition to producing and distributing wheelchairs, the project also works on the community level to conduct activities to change the way that people view and behave toward people with disabilities and wheelchair users and to facilitate the integration of people with disabilities back into their respective communities. The project also provides capacity building and organizational support to local organizations of and for people with disabilities.

The project works to assist school-age wheelchair users by working to ensure that children in wheelchairs have physical access to school buildings and are registered in school.

Finally, the project provides beneficiaries with access to income-generating activities through the development of entrepreneurship capacity. It assists the person in identifying the type of activity that he/she wishes to do, helps acquire the necessary skills for the activity, and provides a microcredit facility to help beneficiaries start up small businesses.