LONDON – Sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) programming for adolescents was a key focus of $241.5 million in funding announced by International Development Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau at the Family Planning Summit on July 11, 2017.
While the investment is part of $650-million previously announced by the Government of Canada for SRHR, the specifics on the projects to receive funding comes two months after Minister Bibeau spoke of the need to invest in adolescent girls at the Global Adolescent Health Conference hosted by the Canadian Partnership for Women and Children’s Health (CanWaCH) in May. The funding is also consistent with Canada’s new Feminist International Assistance Policy, released in June, that strives to address the unique needs of adolescent girls and target the hardest to reach, including women and girls in humanitarian crises.
A full list of projects to be funded from the $241.5 million, including those delivered by CanWaCH member organizations, is below. The projects are designed to provide comprehensive sexuality education, strengthen reproductive health services and invest in family planning and contraceptives; help to prevent and respond to: sexual and gender-based violence and to child, early and forced marriage; support the right to choose safe and legal abortion; and increase access to post-abortion care. Organizations receiving funding will also work with local women’s groups’ to carry out their respective projects successfully.
CanWaCH, along with other Canadian CSOs, met with Minister Bibeau during the Family Planning Summit in London, which explored efforts to reach Family Planning 2020 goals and ensure that more women and girls around the world are able to plan their families and their futures.
Care Canada: Preventing early and forced marriage – Benin – $3 million (2017 to 2020)
This project would reduce early and forced marriages and promote SRH in communities with a high prevalence of early and forced marriages. It would use innovative approaches to support social services and SRH providers working with adolescent girls.
Helen Keller International: Reproductive health of adolescent girls – Burkina Faso – $10 million (2017 to 2020)
The proposed project aims to empower adolescent girls by increasing their access to nutritional and SRH services adapted to their needs and by promoting comprehensive sexuality and reproductive education.
Clinton Health Access Initiative: SRHR for adolescents and young women – Nigeria – $20 million (2017 to 2021)
The proposed project will improve access to SRH choices for young women and adolescent girls through an innovative approach that engages both the public and private sector in expanding spaces where services and products are both accessible and meet their family planning needs.
Marie Stopes Tanzania: Owning their reproductive health choices – Tanzanian women and girls decide – $15 million (2017 to 2021)
This proposed project will address the need for comprehensive SRHR services and close the gap on adolescent SRHR in Tanzania by providing girls and women with improved access to the information and family planning services and commodities they require for informed choices that reduce unintended pregnancies and to life-saving post-abortion care.
Plan International Canada: Improving the sexual and reproductive health and rights of Ethiopian girls and reducing child, early and forced marriage – $8 million (2017 to 2022)
This project would reduce child, early and forced marriage (CEFM) and address related SRH problems for adolescent girls in Ethiopia by expanding adolescent and youth-friendly SRHR services, including family planning, enhancing the official capacity to protect adolescent girls and prevent and respond to CEFM and SRHR issues, providing at-risk girls with the skills and knowledge to help them determine their own future and improving the capacity of community groups to change attitudes and practices to end CEFM.
Plan International Canada: Plan for girls – Integrative, transformative approach to SRHR with girls at the centre – multiple countries – $20 million (2017 to 2022)
This project will pilot an integrated, gender-transformative approach with girls at the centre of SRHR interventions by engaging adolescent girls and service providers across sectors. A research component will track results for accountability.
UNICEF/United Nations Population Fund: Comprehensive sexual education and reproductive health services for adolescent girls – Ghana – $15 million (2017 to 2020)
This project aims to improve access to comprehensive sexual education and SRH services through increasing the knowledge of family planning and available options for at-risk adolescent girls.
UNICEF: Improving the reproductive health and nutritional status of adolescent girls – Ethiopia – $15 million (2017 to 2022)
This gender-specific initiative would improve the SRH and nutritional status of adolescent girls in Ethiopia by increasing access to quality adolescent-specific nutrition and health knowledge and by providing youth-friendly SRHR services, including family planning and nutritional services within the health system, schools and communities to reach in-school and out-of-school adolescent girls.
Save the Children Canada: Reproductive health and rights of preadolescents and adolescents – Democratic Republic of Congo – $10 million (2017 to 2021)
The proposed project aims to meet the needs of preadolescents and adolescents with respect to comprehensive sexuality education and social behaviour change, as well as increased access to SRH services adapted to their reality.
Save the Children Canada: Reaching and empowering adolescents to make informed choices for their health – Northern Nigeria – $12 million (2017 to 2021)
The proposed project aims to improve the SRH of adolescent girls and boys in hard-to-reach northern communities by using age-appropriate approaches to engage with younger and older adolescents (10 to 14 and 15 to 19 years old) as part of a participatory community engagement strategy to family planning.
Centre for International Cooperation in Health and Development: Access to health services in Kinshasa – $20 million (2017 to 2023)
This proposed initiative will improve the availability, quality and use of primary health services in Kinshasa province by responding to the needs of women and girls for increased access to SRH services, family planning, and prenatal and postnatal care.
Pathfinder International: Supporting family planning and abortion services in Mozambique – $18.5 million (2017 to 2024)
The proposed project aims to increase gender equality such that women and adolescent girls in select provinces can exercise their SHRH by empowering women and girls as decision makers, addressing the social and cultural barriers to SRHR and sexual and gender-based violence, as well as strengthening the delivery of comprehensive family planning and abortion services, with a special focus on adolescent girls.
United Nations Population Fund: Syria crisis – Health and prevention of gender-based violence – Jordan – $6.5 million (2016 to 2018)
With Canada’s support, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) will support the delivery of comprehensive emergency obstetrical care and distribution of dignity kits to vulnerable women and girls at the berm located along the Jordan and Syria border, as well as support the provision of reproductive health and family planning services to refugees and host communities in Jordan.
United Nations Population Fund: Family health houses for Afghanistan – $20 million (2017 to 2022)
This project will support 58 existing community birthing centres, establish over 80 new ones and train community midwives to provide reproductive health services in remote areas of Afghanistan. It would improve the SRHR of women and girls by training female health workers, establishing reproductive health care facilities (delivery, prenatal and postnatal) and offering family planning.
United Nations Population Fund: Iraq crisis – Reproductive health and support for survivors of violence – $10 million (2016 to 2018)
With Canada’s support, the UNFPA will provide assistance to 19 reproductive health facilities benefiting up to 20,000 women and girls; support up to 40 additional women’s safe spaces to provide sexual and gender-based violence response services to up to 90,000 additional women and girls; and distribute 40,000 additional dignity kits to conflict-affected women and girls across Iraq.
United Nations Population Fund: Syria crisis – Addressing gender-based violence and reproductive health – Syria – $8.5 million (2016 to 2018)
With Canada’s support, the UNFPA will deliver integrated reproductive health services through existing health facilities and mobile clinics, through the provision of clinical training, health equipment and dignity kits. This includes distributing reproductive health and dignity kits, and providing support to mobile teams to respond to displacements from the Raqqa offensive.
International Planned Parenthood Federation: Freedom to choose – Improving sexual and reproductive health and rights – South Sudan – $5 million (2017 to 2020)
This project aims to empower women and girls in South Sudan to make their own decisions about their SRH free from discrimination, coercion and violence, by improving access to quality SRH services and increasing community support for women and girls’ SRHR.
World Bank: Global Financing Facility – Support to closing the SRHR gaps in national health plans – $20 million (2017 to 2019)
This project aims to support the Global Financing Facility, a multi-donor financing platform that provides country-led, sustainable financing for national reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health (RMNCH) plans and supports countries in the transition toward sustainable domestic financing of RMNCH. This support will specifically be earmarked toward closing the SRHR gaps for adolescents in national plans.
World Health Organization: Building a baseline for SRHR data in Mozambique – $5 million (2017 to 2021)
The project would accelerate country-level action on family planning and SRHR by filling an important gender data gap on the availability of SRH services, including family planning, and strengthening the Mozambican ministry of health’s capacity for evidence-based planning and budgeting that supports the SRHR of women and girls.