A free government app gives Bahamians with disabilities one-touch access to emergency alerts, sign-language interpretation, job listings and transport bookings. Usage doubled to 2,000+ users in year one, reaching roughly a fifth of the country's persons with disabilities.
2,000+ users
App users (first year)
~20%
Estimated share of persons with disabilities using the app
Details
Promoter
National Commission for Persons with Disabilities (Bahamas), with UNDP support
AccessAbility Bahamas is a free mobile app created by the National Commission for Persons with Disabilities (NCPD) with a Bahamian app developer, later upgraded with support from UNDP's Digital Access for All (DAFA) Bahamas Project.
Activities
The app bundles several public services for persons with disabilities that were previously scattered or hard to reach: one-touch access to emergency services and NEMA hurricane alerts, sign-language interpretation, a directory of disability-friendly businesses and government offices, Department of Labour job listings tailored to persons with disabilities, and a booking mechanism for the country's subsidised transportation scheme.
Results
UNDP and the Bahamian government report that usage roughly doubled to more than 2,000 users in the app's first year, with an estimated 20% of persons with disabilities in the Bahamas now using it. One documented case describes a user who found a sign-language interpreter through the app and used it to secure employment. These figures come from UNDP and government reporting rather than an independent evaluation, and no data on longer-term outcomes has been published.
Implementation
Implementation detail (cost, timeline, staffing, conditions for success) is not yet available for this practice.
Data sources
Where this practice's information was retrieved from, and when.
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