Myanmar
In Myanmar (formerly Burma), HI advances the rights of casualties of mines and explosive remnants of war and people with disabilities, and promotes their inclusion in local communities.
Physical rehabilitation session - Humanity & Inclusion Myanmar | © T. Calvot / HI
Actions in process
HI provides support to casualties of mines and explosive remnants of war and people with disabilities and helps them access rehabilitation care and psychological support. HI also helps people protect themselves by providing them with risk education on mines and explosive remnants of war.
HI trains medical teams in hospitals, including emergency services in children’s hospitals in Yangon and Mandalay, in natural disaster risk preparedness and performs advocacy work on the development of national disaster preparedness plans. The organisation also trains disabled people’s organisations to manage these risks and to take into account the most vulnerable people.
Rhe organisation also runs rehabilitation sessions for people with disabilities affected by the conflict in Kayin State.
HI also implements a project on the early detection of disability and early intervention (rehabilitation sessions, psychosocial support, etc.) for children under the age of five and pregnant women among others, targeted in particular at victims of natural disasters. The aim is to prevent the development of complications or a disability.
Moreover, HI ensures people with disabilities have access to services such as healthcare and education and can access new sources of income.
Areas of intervention
concretely
Situation of the country
Negotiation between HI and the Myanmar government started in 1994, but the first operations are dated 2008, following cyclone Nargis.
The program, mainly focused on emergency response, was closed at the end of the response operations. In 2013, after a new exploratory mission, the program was reopened, initially focused on the possibility of starting humanitarian mine action.
Since the start of the COVID pandemic in 2020 and even more since the political crisis from February 2021, economy and financial services have collapsed and foreign investments have decreased, announcing a strong setback in the level of development and putting at risk of extreme poverty more than 50% of the population.
Myanmar remains the only regime in the world to make regular use of anti-personnel mines, but no mine clearance operations have been implemented.
Number of HI staff members: 120
Date programme opened: 1994
