World Blind Union s1

WBU E-BULLETIN

VOLUME 6, ISSUE 2

April 2012

World Blind Union

1929 Bayview Avenue

Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4G 3E8

Telephone: 1-416-486-9698

Fax: 1-416-486-8107

Email:

Website: www.worldblindunion.org

TABLE OF CONTENTS 1

CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE E-BULLETIN 2

MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT 3

UPDATES/REPORTS 4

Update on WBU Employment Website 6

Status of Quiet Cars Report by Fredric Schroder 6

A report on the International Conference on Good Policies for Persons with Disabilities, Vienna, January 2012 8

The Leonard Cheshire Disability and the United Nations ESCAP 10

ARTICLES 11

WORLD BRAILLE FOUNDATION 2001 to 2011 11

Standard Chartered Bank opens the door of opportunity to visually impaired people in Asia, Africa and the Middle East 14

Current Debates in Wellbeing: Vision Loss and Spirituality 15

ANNOUNCEMENTS 18

A tribute to the life of Lex Grandia, President of the World Federation of the Deafblind (WFDB) by William Rowland 18

Presidents Barack Obama (USA) and Dima Rousseff (Brazil) issue a joint statement of support on WIPO: 19

FOAL calls for Rehabilitation Projects 20

Bookshare’s 10th Anniversary celebrated in March 20

RESOURCES 20

Leonard Cheshire Disability to launch world’s first international database of disability and development projects 21

WBU’s website 21

Hadley Continuing Education 22

Points of View from Visually Impaired Bloggers 22

White’s Blind Man Roams the Globe radio series 22

NEWS FROM THE REGIONS 22

AFRICA 22

ASIA 23

ASIA-PACIFIC 23

EUROPE – ‘Books Without Borders’; the EBU copyright campaign. By Dan Pescod, Campaigns Manager, Europe, International and Accessibility, Royal National Institute of Blind People 25

LATIN AMERICA - The 8th General Assembly held on 15 and 16 March, in Mexico City. The new Executive Committee is the following: 28

ULAC'S Dorina De Gouvea Nowill Distinction for Blind Latin American Women 28

NORTH AMERICA & THE CARIBBEAN 29

2012 CONFERENCE NOTICE AND LINKS: 30

WBU OFFICERS 31

REGIONAL PRESIDENTS 31

WBU STAFF 32

EMAIL COMMUNICATION WITH WBU OFFICE 32

CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE E-BULLETIN

Contributions are welcome to the e-Bulletin. We thank those of you who have been providing us with stories and updates for the quarterly newsletters and encourage members to provide articles and updates. If we do not hear from you, we cannot report on your success. Our next deadline for content submission will be Friday June 29, 2012 for our next issue of the e-Bulletin. We accept submissions in English, French, and Spanish, in electronic format. Please send submissions to Marianne McQuillan:

MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT

I am pleased to introduce this information-packed issue of our E-Bulletin. Thank you to those who provide articles and reports and to Marianne and Penny who spend time sourcing material.

2012 has been a busy start to the last year of the current WBU quadrenium which will come to an end in Bangkok Thailand this November. Plans for this event are well underway with registrations now open and the program almost final. It is the time to start planning your attendance which I can assure you will be a memorable time and a rare opportunity to meet leaders of the blindness community from all corners of the world.

Two of our regions have held their general assemblies and welcomed in new regional presidents. Many thanks to those from the past term who contributed to the work of the regional and global levels, particularly Dr Guillermo Moreno (ULAC) and Mr Allousi (ABU). Congratulations and a special welcome to MR S.K Rungta (India) ABU regional president and Volmir Raimondi (Brazil) ULAC regional president.

Special congratulations to Gloria Peniza from Venezuela who received the inaugural award, The Dorina De Gouvea Nowill Distinction for Blind Latin American Women.

A meeting of the IDA governing body was held in Athens during March. It was pleasing to see other IDA members putting place roles similar to what we have created for Victor Cordiero as our Advocacy Coordinator. Already, Victor has had the opportunity to take part in meetings during April in Geneva with other IDA member’s new staff and to attend part of the CRPD committee meetings. This is a great opportunity for our advocacy work inputting into and supporting our members to input into the UN various treaty bodies and other international advocacy initiatives.

I urge you to make the time to read the material in this issue. It provides a great deal of information on many of the initiatives we have underway including: employment resource bank, right to read and our treaty with WIPO, the roll out of our CRPD toolkit and much more.

Maryanne Diamond

UPDATES/REPORTS

Message from the WBU/ICEVI General Assembly Planning Committee

On behalf of the Local Organizing Committee, it is my great pleasure to extend a warm invitation to you, your colleagues, and your family to attend the World Blind Union’s 8th General Assembly. This will take place in cooperation with the International Council for Education of People with Visual Impairment (ICEVI) who will also hold their general assembly and have joint presentations and programs with the WBU here in Bangkok, Thailand from November 8-18, 2012.

During these events you will experience not only updated knowledge and technology; you will also be our honoured guests at the International Blind Music Festival, which will be held every evening from November 12-15, 2012 at Benjasiri Park, next to the Imperial Queen's Park hotel, which is our event venue. This stage will be for international and local blind musicians. This festival will be opened for the public. For who are interested to participate as one of the blind musicians please feel free to contact .

We will also have a Loy Krathong Festival demonstration which is on the twelfth lunar month; Thais believe that all the elements are right for celebrating. The main rice harvest season has ended and it’s time to thank the Water Goddess for a year’s worth of her abundant supply. Many believe that this is the time to symbolically ‘float away’ all the misfortunes and illnesses they have encountered up until this point. Many people also use the occasion to pray for a healthy, prosperous future, as well as for a chance to find a perfect soul mate.

We are also preparing a public relations event call “Big Smile Blind Event” that will take place in May at the front area of The Emerald Buddha Temple and Grand Palace by having 1000 volunteers representing blind people and we will take a photo from the helicopter to show as an advertising TV spot to promote our General assembly.

And we are collecting stories focused on blindness issues of all kinds and will be broadcasting these through television programs, running from July until December. Any of your stories from abroad are also welcomed. To learn more about the general assembly and to register link to our website: www.wbu-icevi2012.org

Senator Monthian Buntan
President, Thailand Association of the Blind Chairman, Local organizing committee for the WBU-ICEVI General Assembly 2012

Important Information about the General Assembly

Registration Process

The registration for the General Assembly is now open.

We realize that some of you have tried to register for the Assembly and have not been able to do so. Our local hosts have faced some challenges to make a fully accessible online registration in the three languages and which also link with the hotel reservations. To fully complete this process would take much more time and money and so we have elected to offer two options for registration. Online registration is now available in English on the General Assembly website at www.wbu-icevi2012.org. Please note that you will need to pay separately for your conference registration and your hotel booking, but the process can be completed online in English. For French and Spanish, we have a manual registration form which you can download either from the WBU website or from the General Assembly website. This form, once completed can be emailed or faxed to the conference organizers. You will again need to pay separately for your conference registration and the hotel. This manual form is also available in English for those who prefer.

Airline fare discounts

Our local hosts have arranged for a group discount from Star Alliance airline partners. You can find out more information about how to receive the discount from the WBU/ICEVI General Assembly website at: http://www.wbu-icevi2012.org/Star-Alliance.html

Applications for Delegate Support

The deadline for applying for support to attend the General Assembly is now passed. We will continue to accept late application forms; however, any applications received after the March 15th deadline will now be placed on a wait list and will only be considered in the event that some funds are still available after we have reviewed the applications submitted before the deadline.

Update on WBU Employment Website

The planning stage of the WBU Employment website is now complete and the project is well on track. Topics to be addressed on the website have been finalized, as has the organization of the content.

Previous efforts to identify and catalogue external content (i.e. content that will not be included as text on the website) have been reviewed and are being supplemented where gaps exist. The end of May has been targeted for completion of all original content.

Arie Opps has been hired as the Project Manager for the next phase of the project. Arie has over 12 years of experience in marketing and communications and has managed the development of several large websites in the not-for-profit sector.

Arie has brought on Karen Wolffe as lead content developer. Dr. Wolffe manages a private practice as a career counsellor and consultant in Austin, Texas. She is the former American Foundation for the Blind Director of Professional Development and CareerConnect®, AFB’s on-line employment and mentoring service.

Dr. Wolffe is also a member of WBU’s Employment Working Group.

Following content development, immediate next steps include translation into French, design, and development. At that time, the site will be populated with content, and then it will be evaluated and revised (if needed) prior to launch.

Status of Quiet Cars Report by Fredric Schroeder
In recent years, consumers have been seeking greener, more fuel efficient cars. In response, as technology has advanced, automobile manufacturers have developed hybrid electric, and more recently, fully electric cars. When operating on electric power, these vehicles are essentially silent, presenting a danger to blind people and other pedestrians.
For the past three years, the United Nations has been working to address the hazard posed by quiet vehicles to the safety of blind people and other pedestrians. The World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulations (WP.29), "Working Party on Noise" (GRB) created the Quiet Road Transport Vehicle (QRTV) working group charged with developing guidelines for designing alert sound devices. As work progressed on developing voluntary guidelines, in early 2010, the National Federation of the Blind was able to persuade the United States Congress to adopt legislation mandating a minimum sound standard for hybrid electric and other quiet vehicles. As a result of the U.S. law, the United States and Japan proposed that the GRB develop a Global Technical Regulation, rather than voluntary guidelines.
Key issues
It has been argued that a car stopped at a red light does not need to make an alerting sound since the vehicle poses no danger while stationary. Nevertheless, it is important for the blind pedestrian to know of the presence of a vehicle that is temporarily stopped since the vehicle may begin to move at any time. Vehicles operating on electric power begin moving more quickly than vehicles using internal combustion engines, making the need for the pedestrian to be aware of the vehicle particularly important. If a blind person is unaware of the presence of the car, he or she may step out unexpectedly into the path of the vehicle just as the driver begins to accelerate.
Some newer internal combustion engines literally shut off the engine while stopped rather than idling. When stopped at a red light, vehicles with stop/start technology are as silent as electric or hybrid cars. Blind pedestrians need to be alerted to the presence of these vehicles for the same reason that pedestrians need to be aware of any vehicle that could begin moving suddenly.
What is the sound level needed to provide reasonable safety?

This question is more complicated than it may first appear. Vehicle manufacturers are under increasing pressure from consumers and governments to minimize vehicle noise. For this reason, it is essential that the Global Technical Regulation not specify a sound level so minimal as to compromise the safety of blind and other pedestrians. The trick is finding a level sufficient to insure safety while not being excessively loud is complicated by environmental noise and other factors. If the alert sound is too loud, people are disturbed. If too quiet, blind pedestrians are placed in life-threatening danger. In working to find a reasonable balance of sound, safety should be the highest consideration.
What kind of alert sounds would be easily recognizable as representing a motor vehicle?

From an engineering standpoint, replicating the sound of a conventional internal combustion vehicle is difficult. Still, it is important that the alert sound be one that is intuitively recognizable as coming from a vehicle. If the sound is not identical to the sound of an ordinary car, it must be close enough that the pedestrian will recognize it without the need for significant training.
While many issues must still be resolved, the world has taken note of the right of blind people to travel safely and independently, and that means having access to information about the presence and movement of cars and other vehicles. A Global Technical Regulation will help give our human and civil rights to independent travel the weight of law.

This report was edited down from the full submitted article. To read the full report, go to our website: www.worldblindunion.org under resources - publications.

A report on the International Conference on Good Policies for Persons with Disabilities, Vienna, January 2012 by Anna Lawson

This conference (attended by approximately 250 people from over 30 countries) was funded and organised by the combined efforts of the Essl Foundation, the World Future Council and Bank Austria. Its aim was to bring together parliamentarians, representatives of NGOs and foundations, academics and disability rights activists to discuss examples of laws and policies that have had some success in tackling the marginalisation, exclusion and discrimination often experienced by disabled people. The idea was that such a discussion, based on concrete and specific examples of laws and policies, would support the work being carried out in many countries to implement the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) and thus to secure a future in which the human rights of disabled people are ensured. Although the primary focus was Europe, discussion was enriched by the selection of a number of non-European policy examples and by the participation of a significant number of non-European delegates.