Q & A Briefing Contents Question Page What is this fund all about? What are its main themes of interest? 2 Why a specific fund for civil society advocacy for SRHR? (Short version) 2 Why a specific fund for civil society advocacy for SRHR? (Long version) 2 What is the present context giving rise to a need for AmplifyChange? Why now? 4 What is AmplifyChange s mission? 4 What sorts of projects will AmplifyChange support? 5 What makes AmplifyChange different from other agencies working in SRHR? 5 How will AmplifyChange work? 6 Isn t this is another instance of Western money being used to promote Western ideologies and standards of morality in countries that have fundamentally different value systems? Is AmplifyChange a new form of imperialism? 6 How bad is the problem? What are the figures? 7 Does the world really need a new fund? 7 Aren t you just promoting abortion? 7 Where do LGBTI rights fit? 8 How big is the fund? 8 Who will be able to apply? Where will it work? 8 How will CSO groups be able to apply? 8 1
Q & A Briefing Q: What is this fund all about? What are its main themes of interest? Gender-based violence, including sexual violence and female genital mutilation. Access to comprehensive reproductive health services for poor, vulnerable and marginalized people. Addressing the causes of unsafe abortion including decriminalization of abortion. Sexual health of young people and girls, including through comprehensive sexuality education and addressing child and early marriage. Challenging stigma, discrimination, attitudes and laws that undermine human rights, including on grounds of gender or sexual orientation of LGBTI individuals. Q: Why a specific fund for civil society advocacy for SRHR? (Short version) ICPD set out a bold vision, but in many areas of sexual and reproductive health and rights, progress has stalled. And despite the good intentions at Cairo, the resources to radically improve SRHR have just not been forthcoming. When the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) became the globally agreed-upon framework for development in 2000, the ICPD priorities were excluded. It took 5 years to correct that. And in areas that impact fundamentally on the lives of women and girls such as sexual violence we are only beginning to understand the scope of what is needed. Policies and resources in many countries still lag behind. AmplifyChange is about supporting those CSO who want to try to make a difference whether on restrictions that mean women continue to die in their thousands from unsafe abortion, or on ways poor women can access the sorts of services we take for granted, or supporting the needs of young people. AmplifyChange will provide specific support to CSOs working on these and other issues. Q: Why a specific fund for civil society advocacy for SRHR? (Long version) Sexual and reproductive health and rights are fundamental to good health and human development, particularly through empowering and protecting the welfare of the world s women and girls, who bear a disproportionate burden of morbidity and mortality as a consequence of poor or inadequate SRH services and rights. 2
It s been 20 years since the ground breaking International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) created a global programme to secure sexual and reproductive health for all. ICPD recognised that reproductive health and rights and women's empowerment and gender equality are foundations for development. Since ICPD, we have seen some notable advances for example, significant falls in maternal mortality. Between 1990 and 2011 deaths as a result of pregnancy and childbirth fell from over 400,000 per year to under 275,000. And the increased availability of antiretroviral treatments for HIV across regions previously denied access to these life-saving drugs points to hat can be achieved with the will and resources. But in key areas of sexual and reproductive health and rights, progress has stalled. And in areas that impact fundamentally on the lives of women and girls such as sexual violence we are only beginning to understand the scope of what is needed. Some 200 million women around the world who want to use contraception are still unable at access the services that meet their needs. In 2008, there were an estimated 21.6 million unsafe abortions performed, almost exclusively in developing countries, accounting for 13% of all maternal deaths. Some 5 million women will require urgent care to deal with injury resulting from complications of unsafe abortion. These deaths and injuries are almost entirely preventable. More disquietingly, in other areas there have been some significant reversals, particularly in the field of rights. Progress has been prevented - and in some cases reversed by issues of politics, religion and ideological opposition. Indeed, the lack of progress in recognising sexual and reproductive rights as human rights is testament to this. Laws further restricting access to safe abortion have been passed in a number of countries; criminalisation, draconian sentencing and prejudice have targeted Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersex (LGBTI) communities; girls and women continue to be subjected to increasing levels of coercion and violence and recent political and social upheavals in some parts of the world threaten to undo hard won gains in gender equality. Some 35 per cent of women globally experience physical and/or sexual violence from intimate partners or non-partners. In such troubled and troubling scenarios, it is sometimes not the big players government health systems or large multi-national organisations that make the difference to the lives of marginalised citizens who find themselves subject to discrimination or oppression. It is smaller advocacy organisations, campaigning activist groups, groups providing the services others don t and self-help networks working from ground up who are really making a difference. They often work in isolation, in difficult or genuinely risky circumstances, and are frequently very poorly resourced. Amplify Change is a unique fund established to specifically support civil society organisations (CSOs) working on a range of sexual and reproductive health and rights 3
(SRHR) issues which often fail to attract funding and support due to their perceived controversial or contentious nature or because they are too small to be at the table when resources are carved up. Q: What is the present context giving rise to a need for AmplifyChange? Why now? AmplifyChange is being launched on Monday, 22 September 2014, in New York, and will coincide with an important UN General Assembly Meeting convened to begin the process of agreeing a new post-2015 development agenda. It remains a matter of hot debate as to whether a goal for sexual and reproductive health and rights will be included in that agenda. These follow on from the UN Millennium Development Goals (2000-2015) and will shape international development and poverty eradication efforts over the next 15 year period. AmplifyChange will support civil society advocacy to recognise sexual and reproductive health and rights as human rights a theme notably absent in many of the negotiations which have taken place on the new Sustainable Development Goals to date. Q: What is AmplifyChange s mission? AmplifyChange will provide a new stream of support for important SRHR advocacy initiatives which, owing to a combination of politics, religion and ideology often fail to attract any significant financial backing from other mainstream funding sources. Its mission is to support civil society working to secure recognition of sexual and reproductive health and rights as human rights that all women, men and young people are able to realise and enjoy safely, without fear of discrimination and violence. We focus on these priority issues because they are often neglected in policy and funding, yet greatly impact the lives of millions of women, girls and young people. AmplifyChange will provid grants to CSOs to advocate for, and support policy on, marginalised SRHR issues. We will directly support local CSOs, support lesson learning and offer CSOs more choice and voice. Strengthening CSOs is a vital strategy for achieving change or progress on the most challenging, intractable and neglected SRHR issues. A vibrant civil society movement is essential in supporting build stronger nations and engaging with national governments to uphold international commitments, global norms and human rights, and help safeguard the interests of the most vulnerable and marginalised. AmplifyChange is a collaborative initiative supported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, the William and 4
Flora Hewlett Foundation and the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, and will be managed by a consortium of groups that work to promote health and rights, led by Mannion Daniels, and including the Global Fund for Women and the African Women s Development Fund. Q: What sorts of projects will AmplifyChange support? AmplifyChange will provide funding to CSOs working to bring about change through advocacy on policies and behaviour that affect the lives of poor people, women and girls. It will support non-governmental organisations seeking to finds ways of challenging and ending gender based violence and stop FGM. It will provide support to groups working to promote and protect the sexual health of young people, especially girls, and efforts to end child, early and forced marriage. It will support groups challenging stigma and discrimination and attitudes that undermine people s human rights, including on grounds of gender or sexual orientation. AmplifyChange will focus on five areas that impact hugely on sexual and reproductive health and human rights: (i) unsafe abortion; (ii) violence against women and girls; (iii) comprehensive sexuality education and sexual health of young people; (iv) access to services for vulnerable and marginalised groups; and (v) stigma and discrimination. AmplifyChange will support grassroots organisations working from the ground up make the case for change - in laws, policies, attitudes and discrimination that stigmatize or discriminate against minority and vulnerable groups. This includes the human rights of LGBTI people where to express or speak out about such sexual identities can result in the loss of liberty or, in some instances, lives. AmplifyChange will support local women s organisations campaigning for new laws to ensure that, when family planning has failed or not been available, or where vulnerable women and girls have been unable to negotiate its use they will not be faced with the harsh choice between seeing an unwanted pregnancy through to term, with all the risks to health and wellbeing that can ensue in poorly resourced countries, or to resorting to life threatening unsafe abortion, which still claims the lives of thousands of women and girls each and every year. AmplifyChange represents a new and unique channel for those working to improve the SRHR lives of people, many of who - through no fault of their own - are often regarded as being on the margins of society and who suffer disproportionately as a result. Q: What makes AmplifyChange different from other agencies working in SRHR? AmplifyChange will provide specific support for civil society working across a range of key issues and across countries. It will not be confined to supporting particular 5
organisations beyond the need that they should be CSO and non-state actors nor restricted to a very narrow range of issues. Our goal is help to build social movements for change through a supporting and helping to strengthen the capacity of civil society groups. Q: How will AmplifyChange work? AmplifyChange will work on the principles of a challenge fund that is, to invite and support good ideas for change. We will support groups to develop those ideas and express them, but we will have independent arrangements for help us make decisions on which ideas to fund. We will have an independent technical review group and an independent advisory board for this purpose. We want to be as flexible as possible. So AmplifyChange will have different sorts of grant options in order to meet the needs of a variety of civil society groups and organisations. So, for example, we will have larger grants to support CSO networks and partnerships, smaller grants for help strengthen particular CSO projects, and small grants for innovation that will be available throughout the year. AmplifyChange will be managed efficiently, with transparent procedures for grant application, selection and monitoring and clear accountability procedures for grantees and donors alike. We want to provide a platform for CSO groups to share their experiences and learn from each other. We want to support SOs to continue and expand their vital work, and to strengthen and sustain country-wide and regional networks of organisations working towards similar ends. Q: Isn t this is another instance of Western money being used to promote Western ideologies and standards of morality in countries that have fundamentally different value systems? Is AmplifyChange a new form of imperialism? No. These issues have been debated and supported by many countries globally for over two decades now and ICPD and several successor agreements provide a strong foundation for the aspiration of sexual and reproductive health and rights for all. Perhaps most importantly, they are strongly embodied in many regional and country plans, for example the AU Maputo Plan of Action for sexual and reproductive health and rights. Importantly, AmplifyChange will respond to the ideas of CSOs themselves. Yes, AmplifyChange has its priority theme areas, but it will not be prescriptive in telling groups what they must do. We will respond to and support what CSO groups feel is 6
appropriate for them in how they work to support better outcomes for women and girls. The impetus for changes in aspects of SRHR already exists in countries across the developing world as do the CSOs which are campaigning to effect such changes. AmplifyChange will make the resources available to help them that many CSOs lack. Q: How bad is the problem? What are the figures? Every 8 minutes, a woman dies from the consequences of unsafe abortion. Nearly 50,000 women die from consequences associated with unsafe abortion every year. 5 million women will require urgent care to deal with injuries resulting from complications of unsafe abortion. In Africa, young women below the age of 25 account for nearly two thirds of all unsafe abortions. According to WHO, about 35 per cent of women globally experience physical and/or sexual violence from intimate partners or non-partners. Some 30 per cent of all women who are or have been in some form of relationship have experienced physical and/or sexual violence by their intimate partner. According to UNICEF, about one in ten girls around the world experiences serious sexual violence, a gross violation of their human rights with lasting consequences for sexual, physical and emotional trauma. UNICEF estimates that some 120 million girls and female adolescents under the age of 20 have been raped or forced to undergo other sexual acts. Q: Does the world really need a new fund? AmplifyChange will increase the amount of overall resources available to support CSO advocacy on SRHR. It will give civil society groups more choice in relation to sources of potential funding that can support their work. AmplifyChange does not pretend it will play a considerable role in scaling up services that is not its role. But one lesson from other funding partnerships is the role they have had in galvanising resources and commitment. That is what AmplifyChange must do. Q: Aren t you just promoting abortion? About every 10 minutes, somewhere in the world a woman dies from the consequences of unsafe abortion. Each year, some 5 million women will require urgent care to deal with injury resulting from complications of unsafe abortion. AmplifyChange will promote women s lives. If a women decides not to go through with a pregnancy, that is her choice. She should not put herself at risk of death from that 7
decision. AmplifyChange is about supporting those CSOs who want to make sure laws, policies and services mean that women can access the care they need when they need and free from stigma, fear or imprisonment for doing so. Women are entitled and have a right to safe and accessible services that do not criminalise them. Of course, that set of services should encompass a constellation of care that includes high quality post abortion contraception to enable women have more choice in how they maintain their SRHR. Q: Where do LGBTI rights fit? AmplifyChange will support groups seeking to ensure that sexual orientation and gender identity should never lead to discrimination or abuse. AmplifyChange will support advocacy for laws and policies that should protect everyone s dignity and human rights. That is, for a world where all people irrespective of their sexual orientation and gender identity can enjoy their rights. Q: How big is the fund? AmplifyChange consists initially of Euros 15 million ($19.4 million) for the first two years, supported by the Danish government, the Dutch government, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. We want to disburse at least Euros 14 million in the first 2 years of funding. We will be seeking ideas for funding soon and plan on making our first grants in the first quarter of the coming New Year. We hope that in demonstrating civil society demand for support, the breadth of advocacy and action we do support, and in showing that we effectively manage AmplifyChange, that we can make the case for additional funding from our existing and new donor partners. Q: Who will be able to apply? Where will it work? Support from AmplifyChange is aimed at civil society organisations on those countries where the status and challenges to sexual and reproductive health and rights are the most challenging. We are not a huge fund, so we need to use our resources in a focused way that offers the prospect of contributing to positive change. So our expectation is to primarily support CSOs in the poorest countries and in countries where SRHR indicators lag furthest behind. We anticipate most grants being made to support CSOs in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. But we will also want to retain some flexibility to support important work in other regions where this may contribute to turn-key change. 8
Q: How will CSO groups be able to apply? Groups will be able to apply via our website (we will have a mobile light version) or just send a proposal. AmplifyChange has an extensive network at regional and country level that that will put to use to inform and raise awareness among CSO groups about AmplifyChange, and support groups prepare their ideas and proposals. 9