On March 24, FP2030 hosted the first in a series of conversations on FP2030 commitments. This webinar featured an introduction and orientation on the new elements of the FP2030 Commitment Guidance Toolkit. It also provided an opportunity for governments and non-state stakeholders to consult directly with thematic experts and discuss country experiences in the FP2030 commitment-making process.
“An Introduction to FP2030 Commitments” kicked off the FP2030 commitment-making process. It featured speakers and moderators from FP2030—Chonghee Hwang, Beth Schlachter, Dilly Severin, Onyinye Edeh, Guillame Debar, Mande Limbu, and Martyn Smith. Panelists were Mr. Yoram Siame, Head of Advocacy, Planning and Development at the Churches Health Association of Zambia (CHAZ); Dr. Diego Danila, Medical Specialist III at the Womens and Mens Health Division Family Health Office at the Department of Health, Republic of Philippines; David Johnson, Chief Executive at Margaret Pyke Trust; and Dr. Vik Mohan, Director of Community Health at Blue Ventures. You may view the recording on YouTube or download the slides from FP2030’s website.
Beth Schlachter, Executive Director, welcomed participants and commented about the importance of commitments to the FP2030 partnership: “Commitments are really at the heart of what we do. It’s the articulation of everyone’s desire within your own context, to expand access to contraception, that brings us all together, and really is the animating spirit of the partnership.” She introduced the FP2030 Commitments Toolkit, and stressed that FP2030 will continue to refine it in the coming months.
Dilly Severin, Senior Director, Global Initiatives, gave an overview of the FP2030 Commitments Toolkit—a web-based tool crafted through extensive collaboration with the global family planning community. Designed for both governmental and non-governmental partners, it is a comprehensive resource that builds on the lessons learned from the FP2030 partnership.
The Toolkit articulates the value of making an FP2030 commitment, provides best practice examples to strengthen the ownership and content of commitments, recommends steps for making and launching a commitment, and suggests actions to foster and strengthen accountability.
The FP2030 commitment-making process:
The Toolkit can be found at commitments.fp2030.org.
Chonghee Hwang, Senior Manager, Asia and Anglophone Africa, Country Support, walked participants through key aspects of the guidance in the online Toolkit.
Why should a country make a commitment to the FP2030 partnership?
The Toolkit’s government commitment form has three main sections: 1) vision statement; 2) objectives; and 3) accountability approach.
There are nine steps to consider in making a commitment, which each county can adapt for their purposes.
The Toolkit also provides context and recommendations on key thematic topics that will inform commitment-making—for example, domestic financing; emergency preparedness, response, and resilience; and youth and adolescents.
This step often begins by establishing an inclusive commitment steering committee—or working with an existing family planning technical working group with clear terms of reference. It is critical to include input and voice of CSOs and young people in this committee. This fosters a sense of partnership, transparency, and inclusiveness, and establishes trust, shared leadership, and mutual accountability throughout the commitment process.
Securing buy-in from government decision makers—particularly non-health ministries (for example, education)—is strategically important for the development of a strong commitment. Involving government stakeholders at all levels, and at multiple ministries, will ensure their participation throughout the commitment drafting, launch, and implementation. Many countries already have strong intra-governmental/cross-ministerial partnerships for health priorities.
A roadmap for the commitment process will allow you to prioritize activities with development stakeholders to guide a country’s transparent and comprehensive commitment process. It also helps define roles and responsibilities, and serves as a high-level communication tool for sharing the process and timeline with relevant stakeholders. Consider realistic sequencing, timing, and level of effort, and resources for stakeholders. It’s also important to consider any additional areas or alignment or commitment—national level plans, ICPD+25 commitments, etc.
The online Toolkit has an excel-based template for a commitment roadmap.
It is important to review progress to-date to determine main successes and areas for further exploration. Data and analysis are available on the Track20 and FP2030 websites—including in-depth analysis on modern contraceptive prevalence rates, postpartum contraceptive rates, and contraceptive method mix. Data-driven commitments will help increase transparency and sense of ownership among country-level partners.
This step builds on the activities in the previous steps. You can find more detailed guidance in the government commitment form, on the Commitment Toolkit website.
Dilly Severin gave an overview of non-governmental FP2030 commitments. She highlighted the four types of engagement for non-governmental stakeholders:
As with governments, there are nine steps for non-governmental actors to consider when making a commitment.
Accountability is woven throughout the commitment guidance for both governmental and non-governmental commitment makers. The two pillars of this accountability approach are: annual progress monitoring (focused on streamlined annual self-reporting) and opportunities for learning (facilitating ongoing opportunities for commitment makers to learn from each other). Key metrics in self-reports will be both quantitative and qualitative.
FP2030 is also currently working with the Kaiser Family Foundation to provide guidance for donor governments. FP2030 is recommending that donors establish a baseline representing their current SRH assistance—including family planning. They are encouraging donors to communicate the amount and time period for SRH funding, and specifics on the funding (priority countries, populations, program areas, etc.).
Onyinye Edeh, Officer, Anglophone Africa and Chonghee Hwang moderated a discussion with both governmental and non-governmental country panelists, who provided insights to inform the commitment process. The featured speakers were:
Below is a summary of questions and answers (note that these are not actual transcriptions).
Mr. Yoram Siame: When developing Zambia’s new Costed Implementation Plan (CIP)—which was completed in December 2020—it was logical that FP2030 commitment was the next step. They also looked back at the previous CIP, and reflected on what worked and what didn’t. During a workshop to develop the new commitment, they asked, “How can the commitment process help us achieve our goals for the period of 2012-2026?” Zambian stakeholders view the FP2030 commitments as critical enablers for achievement of Zambia’s CIP.
Dr. Diego Danila: The Department of Health and the Department of Education partnered on a summit known as “Kapit Kamay” (or “holding hands together”), during which they focused on the common goal of reducing teenage pregnancies in the Philippines. About 500 stakeholders attended the summit, which emphasized multi-sectoral action, informed choice, and healthy behaviors. Together with FP2020, the stakeholders issued the 2019 Declaration on Addressing the Education, Health, and Development Issues of Early Pregnancy. This joint initiative addressed the fragmentation of adolescent health programs and advanced the promotion of SRH among adolescents. Next steps of this partnership include scaling up youth-friendly services, guaranteeing education for all students (especially girls), and using the media to promote key messages that help prevent adolescent pregnancy.
David Johnson: Margaret Pyke Trust does a lot of traditional family planning work, in addition to working in conservation and climate. There are four best practices related to cross-sectoral collaboration:
David Johnson: They’ve already started thinking about their new commitment. It will focus more on partnership and the influence of others—including climate and biodiversity partners—to remove barriers to family planning. Working with national non-governmental organizations can help encourage governments to meet their commitments and even go beyond their commitments. One thing that FP2020 has helped them with is an analysis of the national plans under the Convention on Biological Diversity of the 69 FP2020 focus countries. The majority of these national plans, prepared by the ministries of environment, recognized that population growth was a threat to biodiversity—but they didn’t go on to look at removing barriers to family planning. They are working in partnership with others, to get family planning language and policy changes into these plans, to work on furthering the family planning aims.
Dr. Vik Mohan: Blue Ventures is a marine conservation organization, with 15 years of experience integrating family planning services into their work. Addressing family planning is important on its own, and also leads to more greater, more inclusive, and more comprehensive marine conservation work. Blue Ventures is excited to be part of this global movement to support global access to family planning—particularly among the most difficult to reach. As a marine conservation partner, involvement with FP2030 gives us visibility and credibility as an actor in the family planning arena. They can clearly articulate their value added—reaching some of the hardest to reach communities in areas of high biodiversity. Best practices start with an understanding that we need holistic, multi-sectoral approaches to tackling some of the world’s most pressing problems. We need to understand, appreciate, and value the contributions of people from the different sectors. These partnerships can create win-wins for communities.
Dr. Vik Mohan: They were a little siloed in the commitment-making approach for FP2020. Now, this integrated way of thinking under FP2030 allows us the chance to fully integrate our commitments into national- and regional-level commitments and responses. This will allow for a better understanding of the commitment landscape and better coordinated responses from commitment makers to ensure that no one is left behind. It will also help articulate the added value of a commitment maker like Blue Ventures.
Mr. Yoram Siame: There is a tendency for many people to wait on governments to outline the process for recommitment. He recommends a more proactive approach—to even draft a roadmap and take it to the government, and include costs if possible. This would help make sure that smaller organizations can take part in the recommitment process.
Dr. Diego Danila: You have to show stakeholders—especially the government—the roadmap. We need to show the government that if we invest to prevent teenage pregnancy, we will have a highly educated generation of women able to contribute to the economy.
Mr. David Johnson: They haven’t finished the process yet, but what they are likely to do is to tie them closely with FP2030 to do more than they would have otherwise. We will frame our commitment in a way that we continue to derive the benefit of the association with FP2030 to amplify all of our voices.
Dr. Vik Mohan: How can we ensure that everyone benefits from FP2030 and no one is left behind? Reaching the last mile (or the hardest to reach) is very important. We need to think creatively and work with non-traditional partners in order to reach those at the last mile (that is, the hardest to reach).
Onyinye Edeh wrapped up the discussion by summarizing their responses: “Think creatively, think collaboratively, and be proactive.”
Onyinye Edeh posed questions from participants to FP2030 staff as well as panel participants. Below is a summary of questions and answers (note that these are not actual transcriptions).
Guillaume Debar, Consultant, FP2030: There is no deadline to develop and launch commitments. FP2030 commitments were accepted beginning in late January 2021. Commitments will be announced in-country. Non-state partners are encouraged to explore opportunities to announce their commitments in tandem with governmental commitments.
Dilly Severin, FP2030: FP2030 has lots of plans to amplify nationally-launched commitments. They are targeting a number of events and milestones throughout 2021 to celebrate commitments on a rolling basis. They are hoping to celebrate government commitments alongside non-governmental commitments as well.
Guillaume Debar, FP2030: No, it is not a requirement to have a CIP in place before developing recommitments to FP2030. However, it is important to remember that commitments should ideally align with your CIP (if one exists) or other global or national frameworks.
Martyn Smith, Managing Director, FP2030: CIPs can help set the course for your commitments, but many of the new commitment-makers won’t have CIPs in place.
Mr. Yoram Siame: Having engaged with both countries with and without a CIP, it is clear that countries with a CIP have benefitted in terms of advocacy and accountability. As civil society, it is important to push for your country to develop a CIP, if one does not already exist.
Dr. Diego Danila: They have been partnering already. Education plays a factor in preventing teenage pregnancy. In terms of partnership, there haven’t been problems working with the Department of Education.
Mande Limbu, Senior Manager, Advocacy and Civil Society Engagement, FP2030: Accountability is at the heart of the commitment process. FP2030 is establishing a robust commitment-making process that strengthens the role of civil society, including youth partners. They are asking countries to share their accountability frameworks as part of their commitments (in the commitment form). In this guidance, they have included key guidelines and elements that countries can adopt. This will help with tracking commitments, depending on a country’s context. Countries can design new mechanisms or strengthen existing mechanisms—and can hopefully expand to the sub-national level and also track other commitments, like ICPD+25, GFF, and others. FP2030 will be facilitating office hours to provide support with accountability.
Dilly Severin, FP2030: There is not a set timeline for commitments to the FP2030 partnership. One of the main reasons for this is the reality of COVID-19. There is a very different environment now within which to make commitments. One key goal of the FP2030 partnership is to deepen relationships with other sectors, consistent with the SDGs and the Universal Health Coverage Agenda. The new opt-in model for the partnership is meant to encourage new governments and new types of NGOs to make commitments.
Mande Limbu: They are working to ensure participation of civil society partners. Previously, the process was largely driven by governments. This time, FP2030 is trying to leverage support for civil society and youth focal points. All partners—including those at the national and sub-national levels—are encouraged to be involved at all stages of the process.
There is an FAQ section in the Commitments section of the FP2030 website; new questions and answers will be added there from time to time. You can also email questions and inquiries to commitments@fp2030.org.
Closing
Martyn Smith closed the webinar by highlighting the brand new commitment guidance for adolescents and young people. Emergency guidance and resiliency guidance, as well as further thematic guidance, is also coming soon.
Did you miss this session? You can watch the webinar recording and download slides on FP2030’s website. Also, please join future FP2030 webinars on thematic guidance, coming soon (you may subscribe to FP2030 Updates to receive more webinar information and other FP2030 news). If you enjoyed this post, you may also like this other webinar recap post that involved FP2030.