Team Up and Pacific Disability Forum Partner to Strengthen Disability Inclusion in Sports across the Pacific

In a first of its kind initiative, the Australian Government’s Team Up program has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Pacific Disability Forum (PDF) to strengthen disability inclusion in sports across the Pacific. This partnership marks the first time PDF has formalised collaboration with a sports program in the region, representing meaningful progress toward inclusion in sports at all levels.

 Over the past two years, Team Up and PDF have successfully piloted disability inclusion training for sport for development partners and engaged in the Play for Equity Advisory Committee. This MoU solidifies and expands the partnership, ensuring closer collaboration as well as establishing stronger connections between sports programs and Disabled People’s Organisations (DPOs) across Team Up partner countries, including Fiji, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea, and Nauru.

The primary aim of this agreement is to support the inclusion and safeguarding of people with a disability in sports across the Pacific. The partnership focuses on:

• Provide safeguarding and disability inclusion training to Team Up/sports partners
• Create disability inclusion checklist for sports organsations/programs
• Ensure research outcomes and small grant schemes are inclusive of people with disabilities
• Collaborating to empower sports organisations and programs to be inclusive and disability sensitised
   

Quotes attributable to Team Up’s Team Leader, Andrew Lepani: “Sport has the power to bring people together and break barriers. By partnering with PDF, we are able to draw on their regional expertise to help ensure that sports programs in the Pacific are accessible and inclusive, equity and rights for all, including people with disabilities. This MoU is a testament to our shared commitment to creating safer, more inclusive sports environments in the Pacific.”
 

Quotes attributable to Pacific Disability Forum’s Chief Executive Officer, Sainimili Tawake: “This is a milestone for PDF and the Pacific sports sector. For the first time, we are embedding the principles of disability inclusion at every level of sports programming.  Together with Team Up, we aim to create lasting change that empowers people with a disability to not only participate, but lead, and thrive in and through sports.”

Together, the two organisations will collaborate on the creation of a comprehensive accessibility audit checklist, ensuring sports facilities and programs are designed with disability inclusion in mind.