Join FP2020 by Making a Commitment

In August 2015, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation shared an update on progress in achieving its commitments to FP2020.

• The foundation has been implementing an aggressive and progressive contraceptive research and development strategy since 2011. The portfolio of new product candidates includes diverse methods intended to address the significant barriers that many women experience in using existing family planning products, including access, cost and preferences around product performance and use. Since 2013, the foundation’s family planning team has dedicated 20% of the annual family planning budget to research and development of contraceptive technologies. New methods must be safe and effective for all populations of women; the foundation’s portfolio is geared toward improvements that will meet the needs of groups of women with the greatest need, including young women.  

By cultivating high-level political leadership around countries’ FP2020 commitments, the Gates Foundation and its grantees have been able to work with government to expand access to family planning in priority countries. For example:

• In Nigeria, the foundation is supporting the GONigeria to develop and implement the family planning costed implementation plan (National Family Planning Blueprint), and scaling up high-impact family planning approaches and supporting the development of supply chain solutions in Lagos and Kaduna states.
• In Pakistan, the foundation is supporting Pathfinder International to work with ministers in Sindh and Punjab provinces to develop provincial family planning costed implementation plans.
• In DRC, Gates Foundation grantee Advance Family Planning (AFP) worked with partners to garner high-level commitment among the DRC’s top leadership, resulting in unprecedented subsequent changes in the policy environment. In the two years since committing to FP2020 at the 2013 ICFP, the government has significantly improved access to family planning services and contraceptives through national policy and funding commitments. Most recently, the Prime Minister formalized the national CTMP (Comité Technique Multisectoriel Permanent), which includes active participation by the DRC government, including the National Program for Reproductive Health of the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Gender and Family. Since the official launch earlier this year, the President of the CTMP notes that the group enjoys stronger convening power, including colleagues from the Ministries of Budget, Planning and Finance, who participated in an AFP SMART facilitation in August 2015.
• In Uganda, AFP is also working with partners to fulfill President Museveni’s ambitious pledge at the London Summit in 2012. Three years later, the President’s leadership and the collective efforts of government, implementing partners, civil society, and donors have carried forward those commitments into concrete, positive changes. In July 2014, the President opened the country’s first national family planning conference by favorably endorsing family planning as a key pillar to accelerating the social and economic transformation of Uganda. The Gates Foundation’s advocacy partners supported the participation of both high-level and district-level leaders and used the conference as a platform to mobilize them to renew their commitments to family planning and construct a road map to achieve them. The country’s costed implementation plan was launched four months later.