Over the past few decades, technology has altered the way humans interact. From ordering food at a restaurant to playing online games, or participating in local and global events on the web, technology has introduced to us new standards of communication. Considered an achievement by a large demographic, some features of new technologies have limited their accessibility for disenfranchised individuals, such as people with disabilities.

Statistically speaking, more than 25% of the world’s population, that is approximately 1.7 billion people across the world, have some sort of lived experience with disabilities. About 80% of this group lives in developing nations alone. However, a more pronounced problem is that 98% of the world’s top one million websites do not offer full accessibility to people with disabilities.

Cities, nations, and companies excluding this demographic from mainstream jobs can face an impact cost of 7 percent of their GDP. It could also increase the chances of poverty for people with disabilities by fifty percent.

There is, thus, an urgent need to improve infrastructure and digital connectivity, encouraging organisations to design inclusive policies for people with disabilities. Impactful measures like professional development training, mentoring, and inclusive technology solutions, such as screen readers and responsive design, are also critical.

That is why openbusinesscouncil, the global, digital certification directory for businesses and marketplace; and citiesabc, a platform that empowers urban stakeholders to enact the digital transformation of their city and engage in its marketplace, have partnered with leading inclusion organisations: Ruh Global IMPACT & Billion Strong to facilitate a seamless digital inclusion: FOR EVERYONE.

What is digital inclusion and accessibility?

Digital inclusion and accessibility mean providing equal opportunities to access digital resources, like websites, software, and technology. This entails planning and designing these resources with a wider range of perspectives and experiences in mind.

These designs should be able to meet the needs of everyone:

• people with speech difficulties,

• vision loss or blindness,

• loss of hearing,

• mobility challenges, and

• intellectual or cognitive challenges.

This not only helps conventionally marginalised people but also the organisations and businesses to expand their reach to a wider audience.

Obstacles that exist in the digital spaces

Until now, people with disabilities have been relying on the variants of assistive technology to find access to online platforms. While these could benefit some, using the hardware components with this technology, like keyboards and mouse, was one of the hurdles for others.

Although these could be further enabled with ICT (Information and Communication Technology) mechanisms, including text, voice, gestures, and even sensory movements, it had its own share of challenges: poor digital layout and an abstract content design.

For instance, when a female who uses a wheelchair clicks on a department store to shop for a new dress, she is given several choices. But it is hard to see other associated features that help her decide what could be easy for her to drape. The extra content, however, would help all women, not just women with disabilities, make informed choices about what to buy.

“Really, I believe the big challenge is making certain that people with disabilities have access to the technologies, to those options that are out there, and that designers who create apps and systems and who design this stuff that they understand that accessibility has to be at the forefront of that design. Because it’s much better. Good design should be accessible design. So, I don’t care how pretty or neat something is, if it’s not accessible, it’s not good design. And so, once we start to approach it from that perspective that building it accessible from the beginning, I think that we will see much more access for so many other communities, not just the community of people with disabilities, and ultimately that makes it better overall for everyone.”, La Mondre Pough, CEO of Billion Strong.

An inclusive digital representation

Digital inclusion is more than just making technical upgrades in format and layout. It is also important to incorporate every aspect of the content presentation. For this, it is imperative to give thoughtful consideration to the exclusive experiences of the disabled community.

Displaying pictures of people with disabilities and posting content that gears to their concerns is a part of an inclusive digital representation. Besides building a common notion of trust and comfort amongst diverse groups of people, it also makes the disenfranchised groups visible among a common front.

The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) provide a framework for making web content more accessible for people with disabilities.

Accessibility can’t be an afterthought: It needs to be considered right from the very beginning of the product development cycle, and also during the intermittent stages.

This results in an all-inclusive product that is truly built to make people’s lives easier, while WCAG is sort of a checklist to launch a holistic product.

Accessibility makes sense

Inclusion and accessibility are not mere moral imperatives. It could also make successful business cases. By creating digital solutions for all, businesses can tap into the unharnessed working potential too.

According to a report from the American Institute of Research:-

“People with disabilities present business and industry with a twofold opportunity. First, businesses benefit from hiring people with disabilities because they provide unique abilities to enhance labour force diversity, improve productivity, and inspire innovation. Second, people with disabilities represent a large consumer market for high-quality services and products.” 

“I think that it’s time for us to value all human beings, and stop deciding that some human beings are less valuable because they’re from the wrong country, they believe in the wrong God, they don’t believe in God, they love the wrong sex- whatever it is. Let’s stop doing that because to be human being means we are multi-dimensional person, and we come in all shapes and sizes. And if people want to contribute and make the world a better place, let’s make sure that they can contribute.”, Debra Ruh, CEO of Ruh Global IMPACT.

Learn more:

About citiesabc.com

https://www.citiesabc.com/

About openbusinesscouncil.org

https://www.openbusinesscouncil.org/

About Ruh Global IMPACT

https://www.ruhglobal.com/

About Billion Strong

https://www.billion-strong.org/

About Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1

https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post Video: Disability And Digital Inclusion appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

Data from the UN and global leading organisations highlights that more than 25% of the world’s population (1.7+ billion people) experience some form of disability. A large proportion of disabilities occur in the developing world. If we add to this the lack of accessible digital platforms, the problem becomes even more pronounced, as 98% of the world’s top one million websites do not offer full accessibility to people with disabilities.

Ruh Global IMPACT an international social enterprise accessibility and inclusion consultancy and Billion Strong, a Global Nonprofit Organisation, focused on identity and empowerment for the 1.7 Billion persons with disabilities, has signed an agreement with the digital Metaverse platforms and leadership from Citiesabc.com and openbusinesscouncil.org created and powered by ztudium Limited in developing an accessible immersive digital web 3.0 Metaverse, inclusive, and engaging technology Lab and platform to create empowering solutions for everyone of this community.

Digitally accessible platforms should pledge to focus their efforts on three main areas: hearing, vision, and colour blindness. And those are the principles that this partnership will focus on: to develop a series of digital toolsets within their platforms to make sure they are fully accessible to all while building an accessible index tech to reflect access to these platforms with an all-inclusive metaverse that bridges the gap between the real and digital world with augmented experiences.

Building all-inclusive digital platforms for billions of people with disabilities

The joint venture’s mission is to improve the lives of the often-ignored, disenfranchised, global disability communities. The term “Persons with Disability” (PWDs) refers to individuals who suffer long-term physical, mental, intellectual or sensory impairments which, upon interaction with various barriers, may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others. This includes hundreds of millions of children, adults, senior citizens and refugees.

“We believe in creating a better world which is supporting the 25% plus of the global population with disabilities, using accessibility ESG-focused tools, technology, that offers a support system to those unable to see, move or having issues as simple as moving from their home or sending an email or reading a website. Accessibility and sustainability are critical elements that can improve billions of people’s lives and just offering simple digital enabling accessibility tools can make a big difference. Being the son and cousin of two people with serious disabilities I understand how this is important for families all over the world. With this partnership we aim to achieve our targets by using digital tools, widgets, creating a world-first accessibility index, to have real-time information about these areas,” said Dinis Guarda, founder of ztudium, openbusinesscouncil and citiesabc.

The two organizations and platforms: openbusinesscouncil and citiesabc, have been working on tackling this challenge for the 1.7+ billion that are left aside, digitally wise. That is why the three partners have agreed to collaborate on enabling powerful accessibility solutions within citiesabc and openbusinesscouncil digital transformation platforms. These aim to be immersive, digitally inclusive, and accessible for businesses and city-based ecosystems. The platform’s services offer will include commerce, community-driven experiences, solutions, marketplaces, and rewards for creators, organisations, and other users – a win-win for all.

“Ruh Global IMPACT and Billion Strong are proud to work collaboratively with citiesabc and openbusinesscouncil created by ztudium Limited to build accessibility technology and digital tools that both recognizes and honours our diversity by creating an environment that is accessible and inclusive. Our goals is to make These platforms a practical and solution-driven set of tools and solutions for the disabilities community and being a beacon for positive human exchange and empowering.” – Debra Ruh – said CEO of Ruh Global IMPACt and Billion Strong Chairman.

As a nonprofit organisation, Billion Strong is creating a community focused on identity, pride and an exceptional user experience for the two platforms. The parties plan to co-develop and launch software designed to improve accessibility across the family of organisations at ztudium.

Ruh Global IMPACT and Billion Strong will also engage their Country Partners and Global Disability Persons Organisations (DPO) to assure access for all in both the openbusinesscouncil and citiesabc platforms.

Digital Inclusion: the Accessibility Index and the Metaverse Future

Citiesabc is a pioneer of the Accessibility Index: one part of the citiesabc digital tool sets for bringing digital accessibility to the forefront. This Index is a valuable tool for individuals, governments, researchers, and academics. It provides a general overview of the state of the conversation surrounding accessibility in both digital and physical cities, countries, and globally. It provides tools to evaluate the effectiveness of public policy and corporate initiatives in creating a more accessible world.

The mission

“We are also working on building an open API accessibility system, research papers and tools for anyone in the world to be able to the building up accessible websites, social media interactions, cybersecurity capabilities, accessibility-powered fintech, Blockchain, and big data – all working in tandem to provide a secure, easy to use, seamless digital platforms by billions of people that struggle every day to do it. And working together with the disabilities expert teams and community of Billion Strong will allow us to achieve that,”  added Dinis Guarda.

Notably, this collaborative effort goes beyond these two initial platforms and pushes joint development well into the future. Focusing on the areas of data usage and Artificial Intelligence, the aim is to create and offer special software solutions to improve accessibility in Web 3.0 and the Metaverse for persons with disabilities. These solutions will be compliant with Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) and accessible videos that will launch the user into an immersive 3-D experience within the ztudium platforms.

About ztudium Limited

ztudium is a global leading maker of industry 4IR Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies and research. We build software, research products and service solutions, using blockchain, AI and digital transformation DNA. We create proprietary leading platforms, and software products for businesses and governments. Ztudium has built a global ecosystem reaching over 1 million people a month and has built a revolutionary set of SaaS products. We are focusing on growth and establishing a globally leading organisation tackling and offering solutions to the 90% of the global society and economy that is not digitally transformed.

www.ztudium.com

About Ruh Global IMPACT

Ruh Global IMPACT is a for-profit social enterprise consultancy that focuses on accessibility, inclusion, and universal design principles and practices for larger multinational organizations, governmental agencies, smart city development, digital twins, web 3.0 and metaverses. With over 35 years as a recognized global leader in this field, Ruh Global has a rich history of experience.

www.ruhglobal.com

About Billion Strong Corp.

Billion Strong is a nonprofit organization designed to bring the global voices of the billions of persons with disabilities together. Its goal is to unite, elevate and empower the global community of persons with disabilities to develop a positive disability identity so that we can come together and create positive change. Billion Strong is creating a fully accessible platform that will allow the global community of individuals to connect with each other, and with corporations, governments, and with global Disability Persons Organisations.

www.Billion-Strong.org

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post Citiesabc.com and openbusinesscouncil.org, part of the Ztudium Group, join forces with Ruh Global IMPACT & Billion Strong to create accessible digital, Web 3.0, Metaverse solutions to empower the 1.7+ billion global disability community appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.