Private Sector and Aid for International Family Planning

Private sector is the part of the economy NOT controlled by the government. This can be further split into two groups, for profit and nonprofit organizations.  Longest (2010) discusses the two necessary components for policy makers and private sector originations to successfully work together to move polices forward. First and foremost, private sector groups need to be passionate about the policy objective. An example of a private sector group that is passionate about the US giving international aid for family planning is one I have mentioned on here many times, Population Connection. On January 24th, 2019, the second anniversary of the expansion of the Mexico City Policy, the group took their passion to the streets and displayed a message along the Trump Hotel. See the video below:

Beyond making their messages known, Population Connection also focuses a portion of their website to elections. Their mission is to “elect candidates who understand the importance of family planning and access to reproductive health care” (Population Connection Action Fund, 2020). By stating who they as an organization endorse, helps others who have similar views to know which candidates support bills for the health of women around the world. Furthermore, Population Connection Action Fund not only reports on who will support them in the future but posts a report card for who has supported their positions in the past. For example, in Arizona, Senator Krysten Sinema supports Population Connection, while Martha McSally opposes their position. The report card goes on to cover state House Representatives as well (Population Connection Action Fund, 2019).

The second important component of moving policy forward with a partnership between the private sector and policy makers is having means to implement the policy (Longest, 2010). This means the monetary and personnel needs. Many non-governmental organizations (NGO) have the personnel to move forward with international family planning they just need the unrestricted monetary support from the US international aid.

An innovative group in the private sector is the Results for Development. Their mission is to “create and support global communities of innovators, funders and policymakers for continuous and iterative learning, knowledge generation, exchange and collaboration” (Results for Development, 2020a). On their site, they have an entire page dedicated to support for international family planning organizations. They are working with another NGO Population Services to “to link franchisors and private sector health care providers with new sources of funding to expand family planning and reproductive health services to the poorest women and girls” (Result for Development, 2020b).

Though this just covers two of the many groups out there, more resources can be found on both of their websites linked below. I encourage you to look at the Congress Report Card put out by Population Connection Action Fund and see how your state representatives have voted in the past.  Also, to look at the list of resources provided by Results for Development and see what has been done in the past to assist NGOs in other countries providing reproductive care to women and girls.

Population Connection Website

Population Connection Report Card

Results for Development Resources: Support for International Family Planning Organizations

References

Longest, B.B. Jr. (2010). Health policymaking in the United States (5th ed.). Chicago,IL: Health Administration Press.

Population Connection Action Fund. (2020). Elections. Retrieved from https://www.populationconnectionaction.org/elections/

Population Connection Action Fund. (2019). Congressional report card 2019. Retrieved from https://www.populationconnectionaction.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/2019-Report-Card.pdf

Results for Development. (2020a). About. Retrieved from https://www.r4d.org/about/

Results for Development. (2020b). Resources: Support for international family planning organizations 2 (SIFPO2). Retrieved from https://www.r4d.org/resources/resources-support-for-international-family-planning-organizations-2-sifpo2/

2 thoughts on “Private Sector and Aid for International Family Planning

  1. I had no idea that the global gag rule was a thing. it is extremely ridiculous to me that we are essentially limiting the freedom of speech for anyone who takes our aid. More interesting is the fact that the policy changes depending on who is in charge of the white house at any given time. I can see how this random policy change would really make you question taking any kind of federal aid in the fear that something would change. There definitely needs to be some kind of new innovative change reading this. I do not like it when my country essentially bullies others with aid packages.

    Planned parenthood. (2020). What is the Global Gag Rule? Retrieved from https://www.plannedparenthoodaction.org/communities/planned-parenthood-global/end-global-gag-rule

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  2. Great post! Thanks for providing the population connection report card. It appears that many of the positions by Population Connection Action Fund (2019) are very partisan with only one person in republican party voting in support of their position and one democratic party voting against their position. Unfortunately, both of my state Senators and District Representative did not support their positions. I didn’t realize there were six different legislative actions concerning abortions and the global gag rule in 2019. Do you know if there are any legislative actions that Population Connection Action Fund is supporting or opposing?

    References
    Population Connection Action Fund. (2019). Congressional report card 2019. Retrieved from https://www.populationconnectionaction.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/2019-Report-Card.pdf

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