Country Brief Read Me File
Country briefs are prepared using the methods described in the report and in the method briefs. The results presented in the profiles have the same data and measurement limitations, as explained in the report. It is advised that the reader first becomes familiar with the data and methods before reading the profiles.
What A Country Brief Tells And Does Not Tell
The briefs provide basic information on the prevalence of functional difficulties and on the situation of persons with functional difficulties in the countries included in the study. The country briefs include only some of the results presented in the main text of the Disability Data Report and in the Results Tables. Results Tables cover 30 indicators, while country briefs only have prevalence and nine socioeconomic indicators.
The country briefs alone cannot be used to inform the design of policies and programs or draw conclusions about their performance. The design of disability policies and programs and the assessment of their performance require empirical evidence and in-depth analyses. For example, in a country with a low employment population ratio (also called employment rate) for persons with functional difficulties compared to that for persons with no difficulty, prior to developing a policy or program to enhance work among persons with disabilities, one needs to find out why the employment population ratio is low.
The possible causes for a low employment population ratio among persons with disabilities are numerous. It could result from environmental factors, for instance, a physically inaccessible work environment or negative attitudes with respect to the ability to work of persons with disabilities. An analysis of the physical, social and cultural environment in the labor market would need to be conducted. It could also be due to a lack of resources, notably access to assistive devices or personal assistance. For each type of functional difficulty covered in this study, one could assess at the country level to what extent relevant assistive devices are available and affordable (for example, availability of glasses for persons with difficulty seeing).
It could also be due to whether the underlying health conditions reduce the productivity of persons with functional difficulties for the types of jobs that are available in the labor market under consideration and given the accessibility (or lack thereof) of the work environments. One would need to analyze a particular labor market’s conditions and assess how a particular functional difficulty may prevent work in a particular country.
Other data is thus needed to figure out why the employment population ratio is low. It may be other quantitative data as well as qualitative and participatory data involving multiple stakeholders including persons with the lived experience of a disability and disabled people organizations. Once the main causes for a low employment population ratio for persons with disabilities in a particular country are better understood, it becomes feasible to develop evidence-based programs and policies to promote employment among persons with disabilities. Such an assessment based on a variety of data sources in addition to a country brief may go a long way in understanding the situation of persons with disabilities and informing policy and advocacy efforts.
What Is In A Country Brief?
Profiles follow the same format, with data on prevalence (Table 1) and then on socioeconomic indicators (Table 2). The text describes the results in the tables. Country briefs do not discuss the results in light of national survey/census reports or other studies. In fact, estimates in the country briefs may differ from those in survey/census reports, as the analysis may be done differently. For instance, a national survey report may provide an estimate of disability prevalence for the entire population age 5 and up, while our results only cover adults age 15 and up. It may report results on individuals who report at least a lot of difficulty while country briefs also report on persons who have some difficulty, when available.
The country brief’s coverage of socioeconomic indicators starts with results on the multidimensional poverty headcount, which gives the share of the adult population who experience deprivations in more than one dimension of wellbeing. The considered dimensions are education, work, health, and standard of living. For education, the brief has an educational attainment indicator: it presents the share of adults with less than primary school completion.
For work, it presents the employment population ratio, which is also called the employment rate, and gives the share of the adult population who works for pay or are self-employed even if unpaid. It is informative in light of Article 27 of the CRPD that “recognizes the right of persons with disabilities to work, on an equal basis with others; this includes the opportunity to gain a living by work freely chosen or accepted in a labor market and work environment that is open, inclusive and accessible to persons with disabilities”.
Under health, there are two indicators that are proxies for health and capture some of the living conditions of the household an adult is part of: the share of adults living in households with safely managed drinking water (CRPD Article 25, SDG indicator 6.1.1) and the share of adults living in households with safely managed sanitation (CRPD Article 25, SDG indicator 6.2.1).
Briefs also present results for four indicators related to the standard of living for adults and their households. They inform CRPD Article 28 on “Adequate standard of living and social protection” and include the share of adults in households with electricity (SDG 7.1.1); using clean fuel for cooking (SDG 7.1.2); with adequate housing; and who own assets.
Tables present estimates. Standard errors are not included for conciseness.
Table 1 gives prevalence at the individual level for all adults (age 15 and older), females, males, rural residents, urban residents, and for four age groups (ages 15 to 29, 30 to 44, 45 to 64, 65 and older). It also gives the prevalence for each of six types of functional difficulties (seeing, hearing, mobility, cognitive, self-care, communication). It ends with the prevalence at the household level, i.e. the share of households with functional difficulties, overall and then split by rural and urban areas.
Table 2 compares nine indicators across functional difficulty status. For countries with yes/no answers to functional difficulty questions, Table 2 compares indicators between persons with and without any functional difficulty. For countries with a graded answer scale to functional difficulty questions, Table 2 compares indicators between persons with some difficulty and no difficulty, and then between persons with at least a lot of difficulty and no difficulty. Estimates are in percentages, except in the columns that report differences. The difference between persons with no functional difficulty and persons with difficulty is expressed in percentage points. *, **, and *** indicate that the difference is statistically significant at the 10%, 5%, and 1% levels, respectively, and NS stands for not significant.
The sign of the difference matters. For indicators that reflect deprivations (multidimensional poverty, less than primary school), a negative difference between persons with no difficulty and persons with any difficulty reflects that the indicator is larger for persons with difficulties and indicates that persons with functional difficulties are worse off than persons with no difficulty. For indicators that reflect achievements (work, health, standard of living), a positive difference between persons with no difficulty and persons with any difficulty indicates that persons with functional difficulties are worse off than persons with no difficulty.
The descriptive text around Table 2 tries to comment on the value of an indicator for different functional status groups and/or on the magnitude of the difference across groups as well as its statistical significance.