Influencing reproductive health policy and programs in the Philippines : implementing an advocacy model for utilization of operations research

The model consists of creating a network of policy champions who, after suitable training, will advocate the use of OR findings through a variety of strategies. The project formed policy champion teams in four regions in Mindanao, the second largest island of the Philippines. The teams were composed of representatives from the local government, the Department of Health, NGOs, the Commission on Population, research/academe, and media. A 3-day training workshop was organized to inform the teams on the selected advocacy issue (unmet need for family planning and the use of the OR-tested community-based management information system [CBMIS] to address unmet need) as well as to sharpen their presentation and advocacy skills. In the same training, the teams developed their respective advocacy plans, which they implemented during May and June 2001. The project demonstrated that mobilizing policy champions to influence program managers to use an OR-tested tool could lead to significant program changes. Foremost of these changes are the adoption and pilot-testing of the CBMIS in selected areas in two of the four regions where CBMIS is not yet installed, and the pledge to sustain the use of CBMIS in two cities in which it is already being implemented. The project also revealed that there is no single strategy or approach to effective advocacy, that the level of "maturity" of the OR result is an important variable in the OR advocacy and utilization equation, and that the necessary institutional support system is a critical factor in the assimilation and utilization of a research result. The report recommends that the project be extended to implement the full range of advocacy activities originally drawn up in the project proposal, namely, advocacy of the unmet need concept and CBMIS to policymakers, and of adolescent reproductive health to both policymakers and program managers. The project can then proceed to identify mechanisms to institutionalize the process. (Author abstract, modified)