Accessibility and sustainability

The United Nations has adopted 17 different Sustainable Development Goals as part of its 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. In her post "Sustainability starts with disability inclusion and accessibility," Sheri Byrne-Haber points out how these 17 goals are inextricably linked to disability and accessibility.

The 17 goals:

• Goal 1: End poverty in all its forms everywhere
• Goal 2: Zero Hunger
• Goal 3: Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages
• Goal 4: Quality Education
• Goal 5: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls
• Goal 6: Ensure access to water and sanitation for all
• Goal 7: Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy
• Goal 8: Promote inclusive and sustainable economic growth, employment and decent work for all
• Goal 9: Build resilient infrastructure, promote sustainable industrialization and foster innovation
• Goal 10: Reduce inequality within and among countries
• Goal 11: Make cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable
• Goal 12: Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns
• Goal 13: Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts
• Goal 14: Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources
• Goal 15: Sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, halt and reverse land degradation, halt biodiversity loss
• Goal 16: Promote just, peaceful and inclusive societies
• Goal 17: Revitalize the global partnership for sustainable developmentGoal 17: Partnerships For The Goals

Any organization that endorses, praises, or supports any one of these goals should not actively reject the disability community. Any argument made against web accessibility is fundamentally at odds with these sustainability goals. One cannot argue for being mindful about the planet and society while also actively rejecting the needs of one of the largets groups of people living on that planet.

Further reading

• Making Sustainability Accessible (The Call To Conserve)
• What do sustainability and accessibility have in common? (Greater Birmingham Chamber of Commerce)
• There is no sustainability without inclusion (Connecting with Science)
• Bridging Web Accessibility and Sustainability for a Better Digital Future (Dodonut)
• Social sustainability through accessibility and equity (United Nations)