West Africa

Our Work in West Africa

In the past, there has been a tendency across West Africa for each country to conduct their own family planning (FP) pilot before making bold policy improvements such as authorizing task-sharing or self-injection of the injectable contraceptive DMPA-SC. This impression that each country’s operating environment is unique enough to require its own pilot has for many years been enforced by a lack of information sharing beyond formal end-of-project reports that take many years to appear and are not written as how-to guides to start a program. A series of similar pilots repeated in one country after another is one example of how a lack of efficient information sharing can slow progress and waste time and funds, ultimately affecting quality of care.

The Knowledge SUCCESS West Africa team addresses these challenges by using knowledge management (KM) tools and techniques to improve documentation, and information sharing, use, and dissemination, to make programs more effective and promote best practices and lessons learned. Appreciation for this model of KM as a tool to achieve a country’s FP goals is increasing at national and regional levels.

FP/RH Documentation

We document and share lessons from FP/RH program implementation, in collaboration with FP/RH partners in West Africa.

CIP support

We support Ministries of Health to integrate KM activities and indicators into their new costed implementation plans (CIPs).

KM Advocacy

We collaborate with regional leaders, like the Ouagadougou Partnership, to promote and use KM tools as a means to advance FP goals in the region.

KM Skills Advancement

We conduct KM trainings  in response to demand from partners who want to more effectively use the latest FP/RH knowledge, tools, and guidelines.

Pour nos collègues francophones : veuillez noter que tous les membres de l’équipe d’Afrique de l’Ouest parlent français.