RIYADH, 11 October 2006 — Prince Sultan ibn Salman, chairman of the Prince Sultan Center for Disability Research (PSCDR), and Nasser Shammout, deputy resident representative of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), signed a memorandum of understanding yesterday to collaborate on disability research.
“The agreement builds bridges between the PSCDR and the international scientists through the UNDP. The scientists will assist PSCDR in its humanitarian mission to prevent disabilities,” Prince Sultan said.
Prince Sultan, who is also the secretary-general of the Supreme Commission for Tourism, expressed his appreciation for the UNDP’s humanitarian gesture in collaborating with PSCDR.
The PSCDR has been involved in researches on disabilities, especially among children.
On behalf of the UNDP, Shammout said that it’s a great pleasure for him that his organization is involved in the PSCDR’s activities.
He said that the agreement is a “very promising document,” adding that there had been a lot of negotiations between the two sides during the last two months on the scope of the collaboration.
Asked how the UNDP will go about its collaboration with the PSCDR, Shammout said, “We work alongside our national partners. The national partner could be the ministry; and in the present case, it’s the PSCDR. We don’t implement and we don’t provide policies. We work in tandem with our partners.”
“A meeting between UNDP representatives and their PSCDR counterparts will be held again after the Eid holiday to discuss areas of possible collaboration,” he told Arab News.
He said that in its agreement with the PSCDR, the UNDP can tap the expertise of scientists affiliated with it at different levels — local, regional and international.
The UNDP has a pool of local scientists but it also has access to regional and international scientists. Asked what would follow after identifying the areas of collaboration, Shammout said that the issue of funding research would be addressed. He said that this would be jointly undertaken by the PSCDR and the UNDP, adding that private individuals and companies would probably be tapped to raise the needed funds.
The PSCDR has also relied on charitable individuals and companies to fund its researches on disabilities with the setting up of the founder’s council. Individuals and companies become members of the council after donating a certain amount.
Attending the meeting included PSCDR Executive Director Sultan Turki Al-Sudairi, Assistant Executive Director (Media Affairs) Waleed Al-Deaigy, Deputy Executive Director for Research Heidi A. Al-Askary, and Dima Bashir Al-Azem, UNDP public relations & knowledge management associate, among others.
