In Nigeria, youth with disabilities flourish through inclusive development

Life hasn’t always been easy for Margaret.

The 24-year-old was orphaned as a child in central Nigeria and lacked the support she needed to complete her education. With her limited mobility, she faced systematic barriers to active participation in society.

Then, in 2021, things took an unexpected turn. Visiting a local government office in her home state of Nasarawa, she met some representatives of the IFAD-supported Value Chain Development Programme (VCDP).

The encounter changed her life forever.

VCDP increases food security and incomes by developing strong rice and cassava value chains. By growing, processing and selling these two key crops, rural Nigerians are producing more quality food while gaining access to markets where they can sell at better prices.

Its target population is broad, but VCDP places particular focus on women, youth and persons with disabilities – three groups that are often marginalized. As a young woman with a disability, Margaret identified with all three categories.

With the programme's support, she joined a cassava producer group made up of persons with disabilities and designed specifically to meet their needs. Margaret was provided with essential inputs to start her farm: fertilizer, pesticide and 50 certified cassava stems, ready to be planted on the 1.5 hectares of land she had rented from her uncle.

A talented hairdresser, Margaret saved the money she earned from braiding hair and used it to pay people to prepare the land, plant the stems and harvest the crop. VCDP helped her procure a motorized tricycle so she could travel easily between her home and her field and transport farming equipment, overcoming her mobility constraints.

With these small investments, Margaret went on to show what youth with disabilities can achieve when obstacles to their participation are cleared.

In her farm’s first year alone, Margaret harvested six truckloads of cassava, immediately investing the money she earned her next crop. Within two years, she was harvesting 10 truckloads of cassava and her earnings had shot up more than threefold.

The income has changed Margaret’s life. She is finally able to pay rent, buy clothes she’d always dreamed of wearing, and even re-enrol in school. Now a student of mass communications, she moonlights as a radio talk-show host. And she carefully puts away a share of what she earns as an investment in the future.

Margaret feels proud to serve as an example to follow for peers who feel left out of the conversation. Working with VCDP, she didn't just receive the training and inputs she needed for her business – she gained the confidence to speak out in a context where young rural women, especially those with disabilities, can often go unheard.

“Right now, my mother in her grave is happy seeing me prosper – and seeing me break through all the challenges in my life,” says Margaret.

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Her specific needs finally recognized and met, Margaret was able to turn her life around. But without considerable reform, not everyone might be so lucky.

To this day, persons with disabilities are too often excluded from rural development, community decision-making and institutions. Even where inclusive programmes exist, systematic barriers prevent many people from reaching them.

It's time to remove these barriers – and to make rural development truly inclusive. Because when persons with disabilities like Margaret participate and prosper in rural societies, they contribute to the well-being of their households, their communities and the whole planet.