PartnersGF - 2004-08-19

GF Partnership Forum Draft Report [1]
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Draft report of the the Global Fund 'Partnership Forum'
[Bangkok, Thailand] 7th & 8th July 2004

Prepared by:
Jeffrey O'Malley, independent consultant/Partnership Forum lead facilitator

[Moderators' note: This report will be distributed to the forum in separate sections over the next few days]

1. Introduction

The Global Fund on AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria ("The Global Fund" convened its first biennial Partnership Forum in Bangkok on the 7th and 8th of July 2004. The Partnership Forum meets every two years to give a broad range of global stakeholders an opportunity to provide feedback about Global Fund performance and to make recommendations to improve the Fund's effectiveness. While the Partnership Forum is mandated by the Global Fund's constitution, it has no legal decision-making role. Rather, its power lies in the moral authority associated with strong recommendations that emerge from a large, diverse and representative cross-section of stakeholders.

The Partnership Forum brought together over 400 participants from over 95 countries. Most of the participants were directly involved in some way in the Global Fund, coming from project implementers, Principal Recipients and Sub-Recipients (PRs and Sub-PRs), Country Coordinating Mechanisms (CCMs), Fund Board delegations, or donor agencies that support the Fund. Reflecting the Fund's operating principles and funding patterns, these participants came from a cross-section of government, civil society, private sector and affected community backgrounds. A majority of participants were primarily involved with HIV/AIDS work, while about 40% were primarily involved in malaria, tuberculosis, or some combination of the three diseases.

A significant minority of participants had little or no direct connection to Global Fund financing or structures, but instead were familiar with the Fund because of their involvement in broader issues of health and development policy and programmes. Such participants came from national parliaments, media, academia, the diplomatic service and independent civil society organizations.

Specialised agencies of the United Nations were also well represented.

In addition to the formal Partnership Forum on July 7th and 8th, two other processes were used to solicit stakeholder views and to generate debate and recommendations: a series of regional meetings convened over the previous six months, and an electronic virtual discussion forum known as PartnersGF. While participants at the Partnership Forum itself built on the ideas and recommendations from these other processes, this draft report intends to reflect only the conclusions of the Partnership Forum meeting itself. Separate reports are available summarizing on-line discussions and recommendations from regional meetings.

Formally, the Partnership Forum is constituted to report to and advise the Board of Directors of the Global Fund. As such, most of the recommendations that emerged from the Forum were directed to the Board for its consideration and response. In addition, however, a number of recommendations emerged that are relevant for consideration and action by other bodies, such as the Fund secretariat, the Technical Review Panel (TRP), and governments of countries that benefit from Global Fund support.

An independent consultant was contracted by the Fund to act as lead facilitator for the Partnership Forum. Although under contract to the Fund, this consultant was given full operational independence to shape the Forum's agenda; design a facilitation strategy; invite a team of independent and volunteer speakers, facilitators and rapporteurs; and to prepare this report. Every attempt has been made to accurately synthesize and reflect the views of Partnership Forum participants and input from the facilitation and reporting team; nevertheless, the consultant takes personal responsibility for any inaccuracies in this report.

The structure of the Partnership Forum was intended to allow for as full, frank and creative a debate as possible. Participants were divided into four parallel working groups for most of the two days, and while each working group discussed the same broad topics, the facilitation style was intended to allow each group to pursue whatever specific issues that were seen as particularly important. Outside of these parallel working groups, one session was dedicated to regional gatherings with a completely open agenda. Final recommendations were discussed and verified in some detail in each working group and in most of the regional sessions, but texts were neither "negotiated" nor formally adopted through voting. While this process inevitably led to a wide variety of recommendations, what is striking is how much consensus emerged around a number of key recommendations.

[Key recommendations follow - Mod.]