National Disability Rights Week: The Deaf lead climate action in a pioneering project

Quietly creating change for two years now, Deaf persons have been working with their hearing colleagues on a pioneering project that would enable the Deaf community to be prepared and able to adapt to the risks and disasters that come with climate change.

The Oscar M. Lopez Center, in its belief in harnessing science for climate-resilient communities, has partnered with Deaf-led organizations* on the project “Climate Resilience of the Deaf: Signs for Inclusive Governance and Development” (Project SIGND).?

Project SIGND is a two-year grant mobilized through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Funding for Disability-Inclusive Climate Action (DCA). The grant is implemented under the larger project umbrella of the Investing in Sustainability and Partnerships for Inclusive Growth and Regenerative Ecosystems (INSPIRE) project administered by the Gerry Roxas Foundation.

It is a crucial initiative given that persons with disabilities are affected by climate change in a more severe and distinct way compared to others, as the United Nations Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has said.?

The Deaf, for example, are not reached by sound-based warnings during storms. Text messages sent by the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council, which are thought to be inclusive because these are in Filipino, are actually difficult for the d/Deaf to understand because they use English more often.?

Since the Deaf and hearing team began working on Project SIGND on September 1, 2022, Deaf researchers have traveled around Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao to collect sign language vocabulary, starting with 6,050 signs, and 1,039 of which have the potential to represent 26 climate change concepts. They have also developed 42 new Filipino Sign Language (FSL) signs that convey climate change-related concepts.?

All of these signs will be kept in a sign bank, which will be available in early 2025 on an online data portal for the public to see, especially for academics who may wish to do further research on FSL.?

The signs will help teach the Deaf community, who are often left behind in terms of education, about climate change. Modules will be developed by the Project SIGND team accordingly, and the team will use these to train Deaf communities—as well as hearing people who are service providers—on climate change awareness in FSL.?

Another important undertaking by Project SIGND is the conduct of research into the state of Philippine laws and policies in relation to Persons with Disabilities and climate change, as well as the vulnerabilities of the Deaf to climate change.?

These studies have been encapsulated into six publications which are available on the OML Center website (https://www.omlopezcenter.org/our-work/project-signd/):?

1. Making the Count Matter: The Importance of Disaggregated Data for Persons with Disabilities;?
2. What Inclusive Education Means for d/Deaf Learners in the Philippines;?
3. Addressing the Intersectionalities of Climate Change: Impacts on Women, Women with Disabilities, and d/Deaf Women;?
4. Moving Towards Greater Representation of Persons with Disabilities in Climate Change Decision-Making: Where we are and how it can be improved;?
5. The Climate Realities of the Deaf: Evidence from a Climate Vulnerability Assessment of the Filipino Deaf Community; and?
6. Towards d/Deaf-inclusive Climate Action and Disaster Risk Reduction and Management: A Governance and Political Environment Analysis of the Philippines.

In connection with this, the team is finalizing a policy roadmap and toolkit which can guide government agencies, service providers, and organizations responsible for providing benefits to persons with disabilities, especially the Deaf, as they make decisions and craft policies with inclusion in mind. Through the policy roadmap and toolkit, these sectors will be able to help mold Deaf persons into leaders of their communities, and even the country.?

Project SIGND was also able to participate at the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) last year in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Project Lead Carolyn Dagani, who is Deaf, presented the team’s work during an event organized at the sidelines of COP 28, before environmental organizations.

Project SIGND has also provided input to the National Adaptation Plan (NAP), which outlines the Philippines’ climate change adaptation and mitigation plans. Because of Project SIGND lobbying for the incorporation of the Deaf in the NAP, the government’s future adaptation plans which are based on the NAP must include the Deaf as the sectors they have to consult in crafting these adaptation plans.?

While the Philippines celebrates the inaugural National Disability Rights Week from July 17 to 23, Project SIGND’s work to fulfill one of the goals of President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr.’s Proclamation No. 597, “to encourage every citizen to take active responsibility in the uplifting of the economic and social conditions of the [Persons with Disabilities who are] members of our society,” will continue long after the commemoration.?

Heading into the second half of 2024, Project SIGND is gearing up for its Summit on Deaf-Inclusive Climate Action to be held in February 2025. Its culminating activity, the summit on Deaf-inclusive climate action, will be a showcase of the project’s accomplishments, and will also serve to gather a network of individuals and organizations who will continue the advocacy for Deaf inclusion and empowerment towards climate resilience.?

*OML Center’s partners in implementing Project SIGND are the Philippine Federation of the Deaf, Parabukas, Filipino Sign Language National Network, Deaf Disaster Assistance Team-Disaster Risk Reduction, Dumaguete Effata Association of the Deaf, and Deaf Accessibility Network of the Philippines.