Independent evaluation highlights Alliance success

News from the International HIV/AIDS Alliance

10 August 2006: for immediate release

The International HIV/AIDS Alliance has supported an “impressive scaling up of community action against HIV and AIDS”, according to an independent, joint donor evaluation of its performance undertaken by ITAD. The evaluation also highlights the “substantial and important role” the Alliance has played both at national and international levels in influencing policy and in ensuring that civil society gets a voice and a place in the HIV/AIDS policy environment.

Responding to the results of the evaluation, Alliance executive director Alvaro Bermejo said: “The findings are generally very positive, but as well as highlighting important achievements, we recognise that the evaluation challenges us to improve in key areas of our work. The evaluation clearly shows that unrestricted funding will be central to addressing these challenges and we welcome the input of our donor partners in identifying strategic priorities and next steps for improvement.”

The report says the Alliance and its partners have made a significant contribution in key areas including: building social capital of key populations; lobbying for a variety of issues such as anti-retroviral (ARV) treatment; ensuring access to essential services in a holistic manner; improving coordination among local actors; and enhancing the role of community organisations in the AIDS response.

The evaluation also states that the Alliance’s ‘linking organisation’ (LO) model has been critical to this success, enabling it to develop sustainable national capacity, to identify and engage effectively with grassroots groups, and to channel appropriate resources and capacity building support to communities.

Through its wider activities the Alliance has also “supported information-sharing and networking at community, national and international levels”. The Alliance has played “a particularly important role” in giving communities a voice through its policy and advocacy work. However, the evaluation also states that the Alliance’s contribution at both national and international levels could be better documented and researched.

Many of the report’s recommendations reflect the need for the Alliance to invest more in cross-cutting and thematic work. The costs of this are often not covered by restricted donor funding, so greater unrestricted funding will be needed. The report states that the Alliance has “a duty to demonstrate more clearly the strategic value that comes from unrestricted funds”, while donors “must take more account of the need for increased unrestricted funding to pay for the important added value of this wider work”.

Ends

Editor’s notes

  1. Established in 1993, the International HIV/AIDS Alliance (the Alliance) is a global partnership of nationally-based organisations working to support community action on AIDS. These national partners help local community groups and other non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to take action on AIDS, and are supported by technical expertise, policy work and fundraising carried out at the UK-based international secretariat and across the Alliance. In addition to community and country-based programmes, the Alliance also has extensive regional programmes and works on a range of international activities such as support for South–South cooperation, operations research, training and good practice development, as well as policy analysis and advocacy.
  2. The Alliance has worked with community organisations from over 40 countries, provided financial support to over 3,000 projects (implemented by over 2,000 community and faith-based groups). Expenditure in 2005 alone was over USD 45 million.
  3. The International HIV/AIDS Alliance (the Alliance) commissioned ITAD Ltd to undertake an evaluation of its organisational performance since 2000, in response to interest from donor governments including Norway (NORAD), Sweden (SIDA), United Kingdom (DFID) and United States (USAID). These donors were keen for more evidence to inform their decisions about future funding for the Alliance.
  4. The objectives of the evaluation were to assess the performance of the Alliance; examine its success in influencing the political landscape both nationally and internationally; review how successfully lesson learning, research, reporting and publications are contributing to its programming and policy making; and assess whether its current strategy is fit for purpose.
  5. The full report and recommendations from the independent evaluation undertaken by ITAD, plus a summary of key findings, and the Alliance management response, are available on the Alliance’s website here: Joint donor evaluation of the International HIV/AIDS Alliance’s organisational performance
  6. For more information about the work of the International HIV/AIDS Alliance and to arrange interviews, please contact Simon Moore. T: 01273 718744. E: smoore@aidsalliance.org or Rhian Evans. T: 01273 718961. E: revans@aidsalliance.org