AEGiS-15IAC: Coping with success: Lessons from Tanzania and Uganda on managing large scale funding for HIV/AIDS programs.

15th International AIDS Conference

Bangkok, Thailand - July 11-16, 2004

Coping with success: Lessons from Tanzania and Uganda on managing large scale funding for HIV/AIDS programs.

Int Conf AIDS 2004 Jul 11-16; 15:(abstract no. MoOrE1042)

Helfenbein S, Severo C, Temba J, Weiler V
Management Sciences for Health, Arlington, United States

ISSUES: While new institutional arrangements such as the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria., the World Bank's Multi-Country HIV/AIDS Program for the Africa Region, and the US Presidential Initiative on AIDS promise to inject much-needed resources for scaling up national HIV/AIDS responses, governments and partner institutions have little experience with these levels of funding and even less with rapid national scale-up of programs for which these funds are destined. Pressures to design and implement results-oriented programs that require doubling pharmaceutical capacity or marshalling public, private and civil society groups to achieve specific results are taxing leadership, management, and institutional capacity.

DESCRIPTION: This paper describes how some of the challenges of managing large-scale funding are being played out in Tanzania and Uganda, specifically examining the intricacies of coordination, partnerships, and logistics that must be addressed to maximize the opportunities which large-scale funding represents. In describing these challenges, the paper focuses on the adequacy of current systems and structures to deal with the new pressures that large-scale funding creates and the capacity to bring about changes and achieve results in the compressed time horizons that often accompany large-scale funding opportunities.

LESSONS LEARNED: While Tanzania and Uganda have been successful in attracting massive funding, the transition from underfunded hand-to-mouth management to resource-rich scale-up cannot be made in systems where progress has traditionally occurred incrementally.

RECOMMENDATIONS: If large-scale funding is to make a significant difference in national responses, management must top the agenda for improving performance.

Keywords: AEGIS, Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome, HIV Seropositivity, Uganda, HIV Infections, Tanzania, United Nations, Tuberculosis, Financial Management, Africa, economics, organization & administration

040711
MoOrE1042