GLOBAL FINANCING FACILITY CSO AND YOUTH COALITION PLATFORM

Global Financing Facility “Leaving no one behind”

Introduction

Global Financing Facility (GFF) is a multi-stakeholder partnership which was established as a financial mechanism to support country led efforts to improve the health of women, children, and adolescents. GFF focuses on Reproductive, Maternal, Neonatal, Adolescent, Child Health and Nutrition (RMNACH+N). The initiative was established in 2015 to close the estimated annual financing gap of US$33 billion that has hindered reaching key Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and that is required to eliminate preventable maternal and child deaths for achieving important Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030. The GFF process helps governments and their partners to prioritize, focus on results, and tackle the  bottlenecks of the main system to impact at scale, which is critical to achieving universal health coverage.

Malawi joined GFF in 2018 after the government of Malawi submitted an expression of interest to be a GFF beneficiary country, and the Ministry of Health serves as a multi-stakeholder GFF platform. In Malawi, PAI convened a CSO meeting in which CSOs formed a coalition and elected MANASO as the secretariat to coordinate all CSOs. For MANASO to operate as a GFF Civil Society Secretariat and fulfill its functions, MANASO submitted a funding request proposal to MSH which was approved, and a grant was awarded to MANASO. The grant progress is measured based on milestones achieved. There are four milestones and each milestone has its activities that have been implemented. The project was being implemented in Blantyre, Mchinji and Salima at the district level.

Highlights of the Project 

Coalitions have been established in Blantyre, Mchinji and Salima. The coalitions comprise of CSOs working in Reproductive, Maternal, Neonatal, Child, Adolescent Health plus nutrition. The coalitions were formed to act as platforms where CSOs can share data/information regarding the RMNCAH+N thematic areas. Secondly, the platform was utilized as a tool to harmonize CSO advocacy efforts and finally the platform proved to be an essential tool in the Investment Case (IC) development by providing relevant information that fed into the IC.

Data base was created for CSOs by MANASO as the secretariat. The data base constitutes of 74 CSOs. Salima district coalition has 17 CSO members, Mchinji district has 15 CSO members while Blantyre coalition has 14 members and 28 CSOs at national level.

Orientation of CSOs on GFF related processes. 74 CSOs and youth-led organizations in Malawi under the GFF/MSH project have been oriented on GFF and related processes. When GFF was launched in Malawi in 2018, most CSOs and youth-led organizations did not have in-depth knowledge on GFF and its related processes. But currently, 74 CSOs are aware of GFF related processes and have been engaged in several meetings on GFF.

Investment case (IC) development CSOs and young people were involved in the development of the IC, though the involvement/ engagement at times was minimal due to funding issues.