As ONE continues to advocate for SMART Aid, we’ll be bringing you examples on the ONE Blog of how effective development assistance, when implemented correctly, can save lives:
Rwanda has made remarkable progress in improving the health of its people since the 1994 genocide. The Rwandan government, in partnership with donors, has scaled-up access to health insurance through local schemes called mutuelles de santé. This community-based health insurance scheme provides coverage for a variety of basic services for a small fee ($1.80 per year). Support from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria is currently subsidising the fee for those families least able to afford it. In 2003, approximately seven per cent of the population was covered by this subsidised insurance scheme; by 2009 the proportion had risen to around 85 per cent. Rwanda has seen significant improvements across a range of health indicators. The Ministry of Health is also providing incentives for health facilities to improve the care provided. As a result, the likelihood that women will give birth in a health facility has increased by more than twenty per cent. This incentivised system played a role in bringing AIDS treatment to more than 70 per cent of those who needed it by 2007, compared with just one per cent in 2003.
As ONE continues to advocate for SMART Aid, we’ll be bringing you examples on the ONE Blog of how effective development assistance, when implemented correctly, can save lives:
When the Ugandan government ended primary school fees in 1997, millions of the poorest children were able to attend school for the first time. Enrolments more than doubled over the next decade. Donor aid was needed to support the schools, but many donors were hesitant to invest in the system because of a reputation for corruption. With support through the World Bank’s International Development Agency (IDA), a Public Expenditure Tracking Survey in 1996 showed that only 13 per cent of education funding was reaching schools. As a result, donors made their support conditional on the Ugandan Government’s implementation of an anti-corruption programme. Through newspaper and radio campaigns, the Government informed parents’ associations of the amount of money their schools should be receiving; parent groups were able to act as watchdogs. As a result of this campaign, and other reforms to the education system, a second survey in 2002 showed that 80 per cent of resources were reaching schools. This model has been replicated in other African countries; it serves as a strong example of “bottom-up accountability”, engaging civil society, donors and governments to improve aid systems and deliver smarter aid continent-wide.
As in many African countries, children in Ghana often missed out on schooling because their parents could not afford the school fees or needed them to help work in the fields or the home. In 2004, Ghana started a free compulsory Universal Basic Education Program, which abolished school fees and introduced a National School Feeding Program. Much of this was done with the help of donor funding. Between 1999 and 2006, donor support for basic education in Ghana more than doubled. Ghana is now on track to achieve 100 per cent basic education enrolment by 2015. The removal of school fees opened school doors to the poorest Ghanaian children; school lunches have helped improve attendance and retention rates. By the end of 2008, 595,000 children were receiving lunches through the program, many of them eating locally produced food purchased largely by the United Nations World Food Program. Thanks to this combination of measures, Ghana’s net primary school enrolment rates for boys increased from 60 per cent in 2004-2005 to 84 per cent in 2007-2008. Enrolment of girls increased from 58 per cent in 2004-2005 to 82 per cent in 2007-2008.
As ONE continues to advocate for SMART Aid, we’ll be bringing you examples on the ONE Blog of how effective development assistance, when implemented correctly, can save lives:
More than 50 million people in Ethiopia live in areas at risk of malaria. At the turn of the decade, the disease was killing more than 29,000 children a year. In 2005, the Ethiopian government unveiled an ambitious strategy, with donor support, to deliver two mosquito nets to every family at risk. By January 2008, 20.5 million bed nets had been delivered and a third of at-risk children were sleeping in safety (up from two per cent in 2005). Within three years of the start of the program, cases of malaria, and death rates, had been halved. This success was also thanks to delivery of effective malaria treatment, which can cost as little as US$2 per dose. Ethiopia is working to expand access to primary health services, particularly through the training of two health extension workers per village. Thirty thousand young women have been mobilized to transfer health skills to communities, a vital initiative in a country where health services often fail to reach those in isolated rural areas. The training of these health workers, and the provision of disease test kits and drugs, is paid for by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria.
ONE is campaigning to ensure that the Congressional budget does not cut foreign assistance programs like Feed the Future that help people break the cycle of poverty and hunger.
The Horn of Africa is experiencing its worst drought in 60 years. More than 11 million people, mostly nomadic pastoralists and farmers in south-central Somalia, north-eastern Kenya, and south-eastern Ethiopia, are severely lacking access to food.
2011 marks 30 years since the first cases of AIDS were documented. Take a closer look at the specific, achievable goals we must hit by 2015 to make this year the beginning of the end of AIDS.
As aid agencies warn more than 9 million people could be affected by a food crisis in East Africa, world leaders are failing to keep their 2009 promises to tackle the causes of chronic hunger and support farmers in the world's poorest countries.
Rwanda has made remarkable progress in improving the health of its people since the 1994 genocide. The Rwandan government, in partnership with donors, has scaled-up access to health insurance through local schemes called mutuelles de santé. This community-based health insurance scheme provides coverage for a variety of basic services for a small fee ($1.80 per year). Support from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria is currently subsidising the fee for those families least able to afford it. In 2003, approximately seven per cent of the population was covered by this subsidised insurance scheme; by 2009 the proportion had risen to around 85 per cent. Rwanda has seen significant improvements across a range of health indicators. The Ministry of Health is also providing incentives for health facilities to improve the care provided. As a result, the likelihood that women will give birth in a health facility has increased by more than twenty per cent. This incentivised system played a role in bringing AIDS treatment to more than 70 per cent of those who needed it by 2007, compared with just one per cent in 2003.
When the Ugandan government ended primary school fees in 1997, millions of the poorest children were able to attend school for the first time. Enrolments more than doubled over the next decade. Donor aid was needed to support the schools, but many donors were hesitant to invest in the system because of a reputation for corruption. With support through the World Bank’s International Development Agency (IDA), a Public Expenditure Tracking Survey in 1996 showed that only 13 per cent of education funding was reaching schools. As a result, donors made their support conditional on the Ugandan Government’s implementation of an anti-corruption programme. Through newspaper and radio campaigns, the Government informed parents’ associations of the amount of money their schools should be receiving; parent groups were able to act as watchdogs. As a result of this campaign, and other reforms to the education system, a second survey in 2002 showed that 80 per cent of resources were reaching schools. This model has been replicated in other African countries; it serves as a strong example of “bottom-up accountability”, engaging civil society, donors and governments to improve aid systems and deliver smarter aid continent-wide.
As in many African countries, children in Ghana often missed out on schooling because their parents could not afford the school fees or needed them to help work in the fields or the home. In 2004, Ghana started a free compulsory Universal Basic Education Program, which abolished school fees and introduced a National School Feeding Program. Much of this was done with the help of donor funding. Between 1999 and 2006, donor support for basic education in Ghana more than doubled. Ghana is now on track to achieve 100 per cent basic education enrolment by 2015. The removal of school fees opened school doors to the poorest Ghanaian children; school lunches have helped improve attendance and retention rates. By the end of 2008, 595,000 children were receiving lunches through the program, many of them eating locally produced food purchased largely by the United Nations World Food Program. Thanks to this combination of measures, Ghana’s net primary school enrolment rates for boys increased from 60 per cent in 2004-2005 to 84 per cent in 2007-2008. Enrolment of girls increased from 58 per cent in 2004-2005 to 82 per cent in 2007-2008.
More than 50 million people in Ethiopia live in areas at risk of malaria. At the turn of the decade, the disease was killing more than 29,000 children a year. In 2005, the Ethiopian government unveiled an ambitious strategy, with donor support, to deliver two mosquito nets to every family at risk. By January 2008, 20.5 million bed nets had been delivered and a third of at-risk children were sleeping in safety (up from two per cent in 2005). Within three years of the start of the program, cases of malaria, and death rates, 
