Sustainability

Sustainability was defined by the participants at the Entebbe Disability Workshop as:

The successful and/or profitable continuation of activities/projects without depending on external funding.

It was noted that in order to achieve sustainability of the projects, the following should be considered.

· Strengthening managerial capacities through specific training;

Three particular barriers to sustainability of projects run by PWDs were highlighted at the Entebbe Workshop:

· Poor management of resources;
· Lack of proper management systems/structures;
· Dependence syndrome, which is the tendency to depend too much on external resources.

· Identification of PWDs' limitations and finding appropriate means to overcome them;

· Mobilising adequate funds and locally available resources;

· Saving from existing incomes: the PWDs, their families and the community must be educated on saving skills in order to sustain and expand on their projects [e.g. Karusandara Mixed Farming in Uganda where 20% of the profits were put into a saving scheme];

· Sensitizing the project beneficiaries about project ownership and contribution to project to avoid donor dependence syndrome; and

· Sensitizing the beneficiaries about transparency, especially when it comes to financial management.