Getting engaged with the Global Fund: Learning from civil society in Southeast Asia and the Pacific

Learning from civil society in Southeast Asia and the Pacific

GETTING ENGAGEDWITH THE GLOBAL FUND

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ContentsExEcutivE summary - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 1

1. introduction - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 2

2. tEchnical support challEngEs - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 3

3. proposal dEvElopmEnt - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 5

4. country coordinating mEchanism EngagEmEnt - - - - - - - 7

5. grant implEmEntation - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 8

6. nExt stEps - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 9

Getting engaged with the Global Fund


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this report summarises some of the key challenges facing civil society in engaging with the global Fund to Fight aids, tB and malaria, and sets out recommendations to improve civil society partici-pation and success in Global Fund proposal development, Country Coordinating Mechanism (CCM) engagement, and grant implementation.

aimed at all key stakeholders including the global Fund, grant recipients and potential recipients, and technical support providers, the report reflects the experience of civil society across southeast asia and the Pacific. It is the result of a regional workshop held in June 2011, which brought together civil society members working on hiv from across the region. the workshop was part of the alliance’s South East Asia and Pacific (SEAP) Technical Support Hub’s efforts to strengthen the capacity of civil society organisations in the region. It was funded by ausaid and hosted by the sEap hub, the alliance’s Bangkok regional office, and the Alliance secretariat.

Key findingscivil society can and should play a central role in global Fund processes, but a number of challenges limit its full contribution. These include barriers impeding the participation of key affected populations in national decision making processes, the complex nature of global Fund processes, difficulty accessing technical assistance for civil society capacity building in a systematic way, and limited access to core funding in the case of grant sub-recipients.

Recommendations

Initiatives that could address these challenges include more supportive Global Fund policies; increased technical support, exchange learning, mentoring and coaching; increased civil society understanding and awareness of global Fund processes and procedures; and mechanisms for civil society engagement and knowledge sharing. Specific recommendations include:

1. technical assistance

capacity building needs can be met by regional technical assistance providers, but community- based organisations need to allocate funds for this and also know where to access relevant, quality assured technical assistance.

Contents

the global Fund should make technical

support budgets within grants more flexible; forexample, allowing spending on technical assistance to increase to help achieve increased targets during the lifetime of a grant.

2. PRoPosal develoPment

Make timely and user-friendly information on how to become a global Fund principal recipient available to civil society.

develop a quality control system so community- based organisations can be confident in the proposal writer they select.

3. ccm engagement

advocacy work is needed to bring a wider under-standing among government and global Fund actors of the importance of increased civil society engagement with ccms, and to support the development of a mechanism to systematically support this. this would help increase dialogue between civil society members on the ccm and government, making action more community- driven.

4. gRant imPlementation

Community-based organisations should be provided with a checklist of minimum capacity requirements for global Fund implementation

Technical assistance for staff at sub-recipients and sub-sub-recipients on global Fund operational policy. This should include identifying appropriate and skilled technical support providers.

next stePsThe learning generated by workshop participants has already fed into the civil society hearing at the global Fund partnership forum in Brazil. the report’s recommendations will also be shared widely and will inform civil society’s approach to global Fund round 11 proposals.

summaRy



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The South East Asia and Pacific (SEAP) Technical Support Hub, in coordination with the International HIV/AIDS Alliance secretariat and regional office, held a three-day workshop in Bangkok, thailand, from 13-15 June 2011 to review civil society participation in the Global Fund, examine challenges to meaningful involvement, and make recom-mendations to support better civil society grant performance and participation in the region.

42 participants attended, representing regional technical support providers, regional organisations, regional consultants, local consultants, civil society principal recipients, sub recipients, sub-sub-recipients and ccm members, the global Fund, and the inter-national HIV/AIDS Alliance Secretariat. Participants came from cambodia, china, indonesia, myanmar, malaysia, papua new guinea, thailand, vietnam, and india.

the workshop, funded by ausaid, brought together regional learning and experience on the challenges facing civil society, developed an inventory of technical support needs and capacities, and set out recommendations to improve civil society proposal development, grant implementation, and engagement with ccms. the workshop built on previous consultations, meetings and workshops that have taken place in the region.

1. intRoduction

Jenny Matthew for the Alliance

Global Fund – what’s new in 2011?

Key facts:

In all Global Fund rounds, 32% (17/53) of grants in Southeast Asia and the Pacific have had a civil society principal recipient

19% (9 grants) have had only a civil society principal recipient

In Round 1 all principal recipients were governments. In Round 10 only one principal recipient was a government

25% of CCM representatives are from civil society

7% of CCM representatives are from people living with diseases

3% of CCM representatives are from key affected populations

Round 11

Call for proposals opens on 15 August

Deadline is 15 December 2011

Board decision on Round 11-recommended proposals due April-May 2012

Consolidated disease proposals are mandatory for the first time

Countries can submit stand-alone health systems strengthening funding requests not tied to a disease application. Joint Global Fund/GAVI proposal forms will be used for all health systems strengthening requests.

New CCM guidelines will apply

Revised eligibility and prioritization rules will apply, adopted by the board in May 2011

otheR developments:

Global Fund reform process: New grant architecture; single stream of funding

New Global Fund Strategy Framework 2012-2016: Five strategic objectives including equity and humanrights

Second wave of national strategy applications: 11 participating countries (including Vietnam on tuberculosis); countries organise joint assessment

Joint health system funding platform: Seven countries expressed interest; participation based on joint assessment of national health strategy.



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Accreditation of technical support providers, as well as accreditation of community-based organisations for grant implementation was raised as one way of raising quality. the alliance has already started looking at Global Fund issues within its accreditation process (the alliance is a principal recipient in eight countries and sub-recipient in 16 countries). there is also scope for better coordination of activities between UNAIDS Technical Support Facilities (TSFsS) and the alliance technical support hubs.

overall there is an urgent need for a more coordinated and long-term response for civil society technical assistance for global Fund grants. the global Fund should be focusing more on community systems strengthening (css) to encourage countries to develop strong civil society organisations that can come up with strong proposals and effectively implement them.

Recommendations

1. think lonGer term

Formulate long-term technical support and capacity development plans.

technical assistance should be long-term capacity building and not just a workshop or training event.

regional civil society technical support is important for local organisations.

countries need to have a system for delivery of technical assistance to civil society.

2. support Greater south-south learninG

Civil society organisations need to look for alternative methods to build their capacity, particularly horizontal learning and exchange.

Establish civil society regional and country communication platforms to share information, skills and best practice.

3. improve access to inFormation on technical support providers

Regional organisations should take the lead in supporting information dissemination

although there is growing evidence that civil society principal recipients are outperforming governments in this region, limited funds and capacity to strengthen systems for grant management and implementation remain a particular challenge. There is no clear or systematic approach to strengthening civil society organisations in the region, and civil society has limited information on where to access technical assistance that is specific to their needs. Technical assistance providers also lack a sufficient understanding of civil society’s needs, with very limited structured identification of support needs. But it is clear that support is not just required for grant implementation, but also for strengthening engagement in ccms and other global Fund processes. timing is also important for success – civil society organisations ideally need capacity building before they are already implementing Global Fund grants.

Experience suggests that the great majority of technical assistance happens horizontally between civil society organisations through cross-organisational learning. this peer-to-peer support, such as apn+’s support to its country networks (see case study below), is not always seen as technical assistance – particularly if there are no formal contractual arrangements – but can be some of the most valuable support. the most successful alliance technical support hubs are also the ones using their own local programmatic staff rather than international consultants. For some organisations, requesting technical assistance is seen as a tacit admission of weakness rather than a practical acknowledgement of an organisational development need. This ties in with the view of some civil society organisations that they are in competition with each other.

More innovative methods could also be used for capacity building (to increase access and reduce costs). this could include online training, sharing of guidelines, documentation of best practice, and learning exchanges. one example of this is the alliance’s online course on the global Fund cycle. This is a monitored course so participants can send questions to the Alliance and will get answers back within an hour.

2. technical suPPoRt challenges



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monitoring and evaluation system requirements. And an exchange between KHANA in Cambodia and the Center for Supporting Community Development Initiatives (SCDI) in Vietnam focused on onward granting procedures, sub-grantee assessment, donor compliance, and familiarization with the Alliance accreditation system.

the southeast asia technical support hub

The Alliance’s Southeast Asia and the Pacific (SEAP) Technical Support Hub is based in Cambodia at the Alliance’s linking organisation the Khmer HIV/AIDS NGO Alliance (KHANA). The hub provides high quality technical support to civil society organisations working on community-based HIV prevention and care in Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Mongolia, the Philippines and Thailand. This includes support on Global Fund processes. One of its key objectives in 2011 is to strengthen the capacity of community-based organisations in the region in Global Fund grant implementation, and to enhance their ability to become new or repeat grantees.

Last year the hub provided over 1,180 days of support on Global Fund capacity development and CCM strengthening, HIV technical areas, organisational development, monitoring and evaluation, and financial planning and management. For example, it provided support on health system strengthening targeting most-at-risk populations in concentrated epidemics, developed service models for peer-led methadone maintenance treatment adherence support, and mobilised people living with HIV through leadership capacity building of local, regional and national positive people’s networks.

The hub builds capacity through training, workshops, support visits, mentorship, dissemination of publication and tools, and by sharing research and best practice. It has contributed to the national and regional evidence base with a study of most-at-risk young people in Cambodia, an Asia regional mapping of youth sexual reproductive health networks and NGOs, and through conducting a national HIV Stigma Index study.

The SEAP hub is one of seven regional technical support hubs set up by the Alliance to strengthen the pool of leaders able to champion the HIV response, and develop the skills and resources of civil society organisations to take effective action on HIV. The SEAP hub is the only one hub with donor funding to sponsor its support (from AusAID). In future SEAP aims to charge a fee for consultants and a small management fee, to ensure its long-term sustainability.

on technical support providers and access to technical assistance.

Ensure information on Alliance hubs and TSFs are accessible to civil society in the region.

4. think broader internal skills building between civil society

organisations and networks needs to be recognised as technical assistance and funds should be allocated to support this process.

horizontal learning needs to be recognised as sustainable and long-term capacity building for civil society.

5. the Global Fund should increase budGet Flexibility For technical support

Make money left over from Global Fund budgets available for reuse for technical support; there should also be more flexibility to modify or expand initial technical support plans.

There should be more flexibility on budgeting for adhoc technical support.

civil society should engage with all global Fund Portfolio Managers to ensure that attitudes towards technical assistance budgets are consistent.

Quote:“although nahdlatul ulama manages about 13% of the total global Fund grant, the process was very difficult in the beginning as we did not get any technical assistance from the global Fund or the other key partners in indonesia. We were told by the CCM to get support from civil society organisations, but as a first time principal recipient we didn’t know how to engage with civil society organisations, or how to develop a system to provide technical assistance to them.”

Esty Febriani, Nahdlatul Ulama (civil society principal recipient for a Global Fund Round 9 grant in Indonesia)

alliance horizontal learninG exchanGes

The Alliance supported a number of learning exchanges in 2010. For example, Rumah Cemara visited Alliance China in April 2010 to learn about its methadone maintenance treatment support programme. Staff went on to develop a strategic plan for a similar programme in Bandung, West Java, Indonesia. Alliance India hosted staff from Alliance Myanmar, a new sub-recipient to the Global Fund, to familiarize them with Global Fund



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there are a number of challenges that prevent effective proposal development by civil society. overall there is a lack of capacity within the sector and Global Fund requirements can be daunting for smaller organisations. There are also a limited number of mechanisms to engage civil society organisations in the proposal development process, and language barriers can put some organisations off.

Principal recipient and sub-recipient selection is also usually a closed process with CCMs often not providing information on the selection process or explanations for why organisations have and have not been chosen. in fact ccm members in some countries sometimes gain automatic selection.

There is also often limited involvement of civil society in the proposal development process, with a lack of clarity about the proposal writing team, a lack of transparency on the process and decision-making, and a lack of time and support for proposal preparation. It is important that principal recipients and sub-recipients match their expressions of interest with known priority areas.

A particular challenge in the upcoming Round 11 will be the consolidation of work plans and the proposals for multiple principal recipients and sub-recipients. Although many donors are shifting their funding support to grant implementation, both the alliance hubs and tsFs may be able to provide limited support. the alliance will be focusing on internal support for round 11, while the sEap tsF has proposal development funds that civil society can apply for.

3. PRoPosal develoPment

Alliance regional global fund learning initiative, Sok Vatola 2011

Recommendations

1. civil society principal recipients need to engage with proposal writers from the beginning of the process.

2. Ensure there is a system of quality control during the selection process for consultants and for the provision of technical support.

3. hold mock technical review panels for civil society proposals a month prior to submission. the mock technical review panel should be composed of proposal writers and other experts on community systems strengthening and global Fund requirements.

4. Ensure there is timely and user-friendly information on how to become a principal recipient. this should beprovided by ccms and other technical support providers, and should demystify some of the frequent issues encountered during proposal development.

5. proposals must contain a long-term technical support plan for sub-recipients coordinated by principal recipients. technical support plans should be a prerequisite for grant approval, and include an indication of how technical assistance will be managed and capacity enhanced.

6. Establish multiple mechanisms for civil society to engage in proposal development. this could include face-to-face meetings and virtual/ online methods.

7. civil society needs more clarity on what support is available for proposal development and from whom.

8. develop new guidelines on proposal development including tools to assist in needs assessment.

9. local consultants should mentor country networks to prepare their work plan and budget.

10. Set up effective local translation processes so that country networks can express their proposal work plan in local languages.



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Sok Vatola 2011

proposal development in practice

APN+, the regional network of people living with HIV in Asia Pacific, successfully developed a Global Fund Round 10 multi-country proposal to address national gaps in services, increase treatment access, support country networks to do advocacy, and improve information systems at the regional level.

First APN+ formed a technical writing team, it then identified partners such as the UNAIDS Regional Support Team, Technical Support Facility and Country Office, and then invited network members from Bangladesh, Indonesia, Laos, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines and Vietnam to join. The development process took an estimated 750 working hours divided between 21 people over seven months, and cost around $96,000.

Key stages in the proposal development process included:

1. Country networks identified their needs and service gaps in their country, while apn+ notified the CCM of the regional proposal

2. The proposal writing team analysed the needs and gaps and identified common elements

3. The proposal writing team then proposed the common elements to the country networks

4. Country networks negotiated on these elements and built country activities based on them

5. The proposal writing team analysed the activities and ensured there was no overlap with existing in-country activities

6. The proposal writing team collected and analysed information to support these activities, while country networks engaged in discussion with other civil society groups

7. The proposal writing team prepared the proposal form (narrative, work plan, budget, and performance indicators) while the country networks started discussions with the ccm.

8. mock proposal reviews

9. ccm review and endorsement.

the result was a category 2a proposal, which received $3 million from an initial application of $15 million. as a result the regional network also gained first hand experience of Global Fund proposal development, 11 country networks significantly increased their capacity, and seven national networks of people living with HIV met the minimum standards required to be a global Fund sub-recipient.

technical support and assistance:partners such as the unaids regional support team and -sEap tsF provided technical assistance and support – mentoring apn+, ensuring it met the minimum standards for a principal recipient, and ensuring the proposal met Global Fund priorities and requirements.



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the biggest barrier to civil society engagement with ccms is a lack of funding and support to strengthen ccm systems and processes and to boost representation of civil society – this means building transparency and improving limited communication and information systems. These weaknesses have led to a hostile climate that makes it more difficult for key affected populations to become engaged. Only 3% of CCM representatives in the region are from key affected populations. In some cases, their engagement is limited because of stigma and punitive laws and policies such as criminalization. As a result, CCMs often talk more about processes, guidelines and systems, rather than looking at the needs of their communities or the quality of implementation at the country level.

CCMs are also often seen as a government entity and in countries where governments dominate them, there can be fear and reluctance within civil society to engage. civil society engagement is also limited by lack of financial resources, language barriers and limited access to Internet. This often means that local civil society organisations are being represented in the CCMs by international NGOs or government entities.

Civil society representatives are also selected through inconsistent procedures. Even where they are represented in CCMs, they are often unable to genuinely participate in decision-making and have limited involvement in proposal development and grant oversight. Civil society representatives also often lack the capacity and expertise to fully engage in ccm processes and to accountably represent their constituents – and are sometimes seen to lose touch with their constituencies and their core mandate. however, as long as local ngos stay away from the response, the larger international ngos and governments will get the money for implementation.

Quote:“As soon as civil society representatives sit on the CCMs they stop criticizing. It is different when you’re outside the ccm, but when you join there is lot of pressure to conform.”Rico Gustav, APN+

Recommendations

1. Sensitization and capacity development for government and other ccm stakeholders on civil society engagement. the global Fund and its partners should also do more to advocate for community systems strengthening with ccms.

2. Establish mechanisms for civil society engagement such as coordination, communication, information flows, and learning exchanges at country and regional level between civil society members and the ccm, as well as between government, civil society and ccm.

3. Capacity building for civil society organisations to engage more meaningfully.

4. regional networks should provide capacity building to civil society ccm members to strengthen their engagement and advocacy with the global Fund.

5. Orientation for CCM representatives and on-going mentoring within and between ccms.

6. Build the capacity of civil society and what it can bring to ccm discussions, and enable representatives to engage more meaningfully on CCMs and better represent their sector.

7. advocate for global Fund funding mechanisms to support other community platforms so that more information on community needs are filtered to civil society representatives on the ccms.

8. In each country, civil society representatives on ccms should be elected through an open, transparent and inclusive process that is led by local civil society itself.

9. Ensure key affected populations are meaning fully involved in all stages and processes of decision-making in ccms – not just in principle, but also in practice.

4. ccm engagement



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principal recipients and sub-recipients face a host of challenges implementing grants successfully. human resource costs for sub-recipients and principal recipients are regularly cut during grant negotiation, and governments can hold significant influence over principal recipient budgets and overall decisions on grant implementation. Registration issues regularly arise, and once implementation has started, changes in government policy and targets can affect programmes, as can currency fluctuations and inflation.

requirements requested by principal recipients are often not feasible for sub-recipients, and sometimes they are the principal recipient’s understanding of the requirements rather than global Fund requests. sub-recipients also face limited access to core funding and delays in disbursement of funding from principal recipients. Monitoring and evaluation requirements and reporting forms also change (sometimes quite often) during the course of grant implementation. Finally, a lack of information sharing on best practice means opportunities for learning and improvement can be missed.

The majority of civil society organisations involved in Global Fund implementation urgently require technical assistance for finance and program management. They face organisational challenges as a result of a large influx of Global Fund money and from new reporting requirements, but often the detailed technical assistance needed for implementation is not adequately identified during proposal development. And despite identification of technical assistance needs during implementation, budget reallocation towards technical assistance rarely occurs.

these challenges have led to shortcomings in grant imple-mentation highlighted by the Global Fund’s independent Office of the Inspector General (oig). the oig, which was set up to carry out

audits, inspections, fraud investigations, assurance validation and functional reviews, identified a number of areas of weakness relating to grant imple-mentation in a 2009 study. These included:

weak sub-recipient management by principal recipients, and failure to have external audits for sub-recipients

overpriced procurement contracts and weak logistics and stores management

excessive salaries and allowances paid out of global Fund grants

proper books of account not kept, inadequate budgeting, and budget planning

large cash transactions and insufficient supporting documents for cash advances

weak monitoring and evaluation frameworks

slow programme implementation and late reporting.

Recommendations

1. Provide community-based organisations with a checklist of minimum capacity requirements for Global Fund implementation.

2. Use the NGO Code of Practice in any organisational assessment.

3. Build a national pool of technical support providers with relevant expertise through mentorship by international or regional technical assistance providers, peer-to-peer learning, and mapping of expertise.

4. civil society principal recipients should develop a good working relationship with their Global Fund Portfolio Manager. Global Fund Portfolio Managers also need to engage more with civil society sub-recipients at the country level.

5. gRant imPlementation

Conversations - Cambodia



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5. the global Fund needs to address programme quality issues, making sure there are technical support elements that address quality and operations research to support community interventions.

6. civil society needs to play a stronger watch- dog role.

7. civil society principal recipients and sub recipients should undergo mock OIG inspections.

8. Sharing implementation experiences and practical examples of problem solving is essential.

9. there needs to be more discussion around risk management within civil society sub- recipients.

Specific technical support requirements:

1. Technical assistance for staff at sub-recipients and sub-sub-recipients on:

Global Fund operational policy – this should include identifying appropriate and skilled technical support providers

developing a monitoring framework to ensure a strong monitoring and evaluation system, which allows effective reporting and evaluation of data by civil society.

2. Skills training on negotiation skills, financial management, planning and programme implementation, advocacy (particularly with local global Fund agents), and language barriers.

3. Organisational development, including core skills training.

6. next stePs

this workshop report provides a summary of learning from Southeast Asia and the Pacific, with recommendations for more effective engagement of civil society with the global Fund. its learning and recommendations will be taken forward in a number of ways.

this report will be shared widely, including at icaap in august 2011, through the alliance secretariat website, and by alliance partners.

the report’s advocacy messages have already been taken to the global Fund partnership Forum meeting in Brazil (which took place in June 2011) by delegates present at the workshop.

A guidance note on technical support facilitiesand other technical support resources will

be developed and shared by unaids technical Support Facilities and Alliance Technical Support hubs.

an online training resource about ccms will be developed by the alliance for civil society, as well as an advocacy plan to promote community systems strengthening with ccms and the global Fund.

A community of practice will be set up for global Fund round 11 proposal development, as well as documen-tation, guidance tools and best practice.

the capacity mapping carried out at the workshop will be developed further by participants and technical support providers and shared widely.

Participants also committed to a number of country level initiatives as a result of the workshop, which will be taken forward.

Quote:“We plan to have a civil society consultation on grant implementation. We also want to see the continuation of civil society capacity building in vietnam. however, due to limited funding for non-grantees, SCDI has just submitted an expression of interest to the hub to build our capacity on implementation and for organizational and network strengthening.” Oanh, SCDI, Vietnam

sok vatola 2011


GETTING ENGAGEDWITH THE GLOBAL FUND

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Getting engaged with the Global Fund: Learning from civil society in Southeast Asia and the Pacific