Tobacco Control in Africa - TCA

IDRC, the Access To Information Act and effective communication

The process to request information from IDRC is now clearly mentioned on their site. Requirements: being a Canadian citizen or a resident of Canada, pay a CAD 5 fee. Unfortunately none of the other big donors, Foundations, international institution like WHO or NGO is that transparent despite eventual claims that they are or want to be. Of course it would even be better if the information was readily available so one does not even have to ask for it. That would be proactive disclosure. Visiting the pages devoted to the Research in International Tobacco Control I was unable to find any precise information about the past and ongoing projects. Maybe they are still in the (very slow) process of transferring the info from their previous site. Still... with the staff they have it should not take that long. Why not one or several blogs? But that suggestion I already made 3 years ago... without success. Except for abruptly terminating my communication consulting contract. It remains a valid suggestion.

What happened to the Global Smokefree Partnership?

Visiting the site of the Global Smokefree Partnership after reading Tih's article about the slow growth of smokefree places in Africa it looks like nothing has been posted since november 2010. GSP, managed by ACS had received a grant from IDRC to help ATSA teams in 6 countries: Cameroon, Eritrea, Ghana, Malawi, Senegal, Zambia. What happened to this project? What happened to GSP? 

ITC gets grant: will include some work in Africa (Kenya, Nigeria and Zambia)

FCA tells us the Canadian International Tobacco Control Policy Evaluation Project received a C$7.4 million grant to support its policy studies in various low and middle income countries including studies in Kenya, Nigeria and Zambia.

Promoting smoke-free workplaces in Africa

In a recent post on the FCA website, Tih Ntiabang regrets that there are not more smoke-free workplaces and public places in Africa. He gives two examples: a stadium in Lubumbashi and the Conakri airport. I just read about a US PR company, Edelman, that is very active in promoting a smoke-free workplace. They even offer $2000 to each employee who quits smoking. Unfortunately they don't have an office in Africa. Maybe they still could help raise the awareness about this issue and increase the number and visibility of businesses that get smoke-free? What about an African directory of the smoke-free companies? An African smoke-free challenge?

Global Integrity: governance research in Africa

This is a very interesting model. Can you imagine what it could achieve for tobacco control, that none of the present projects is doing, despite much bigger funding? Remember that you first learned about it here. Maybe some of your could be interested to be part of this project as local researchers.

Looking at the recent grant awarded by the European Commission to support the implementation of FCTC in 'lower income countries"

The European Union and the EU countries fund about half of the $9 million FCTC Secretariat budget. The Commission recently awarded WHO-FCTC a complementary grant of Euros 5.2 million. If you want to look at the details of this grant you have to go to this pdf document and scroll down to page 7 to click on the Annex B link and scroll down again. Since I am curious about how funds are allocated I did all those tedious moves. Below are some of my comments.

Uganda: plenty of pictures of the capacity building workshop on Facebook

Here. Any question?

South Africa: The National Council Against Smoking has a new website

Click here.

Uganda: Dr. Possy Mugyenyi urges the government to pass a tobacco control law

Dr. Possy Mugyenyi, previously manager of the Uganda National Expansion Programme on Immunisation and now manager of the newly created Center for Tobacco Control in Africa made a presentation on September 21 at the All for Health One Health conference . See the pdf documents here page 1 and page 2. Read also on Facebook about the visit and 3 day capacity building workshop conducted by ATCC.

Bill Gates to suggest raising taxes on tobacco worldwide

From this article that focuses on a Robin Hood Tax but also includes tobacco tax:
In addition to the FTT, Gates's report will likely suggest raising taxes on tobacco to the World Health Organisation (WHO) target of at least 70 percent. If fully implemented by the G20 and the rest of the EU, according to the note, revenues could reach 170 billion dollars a year, "a small part" of which could be earmarked to a "Solidarity Tobacco Contribution" for global health agencies, such as the WHO, the Global Fund, and Unicef, among others. What are the obstacles to raising tobacco taxes in Africa? The influence of the industry, the weakness of the tax/customs administrations, the prevalence of smuggling, the diversity of the situation in neighboring countries, the lack of motivation for political leaders?

Mike Bloomberg: taking action today against tobacco... How does that apply to Africa

Mike Bloomberg affirms again his conviction against tobacco and describes what can/should be done. He gives the example of New York City. Can the same strategy be successfully implemented in Africa? What are the roadblocks? How best to organize? How best to use the millions he and Bill Gates generously give? How best to communicate about what is achieved?

How difficult is it to speak truth to power at the Gates Foundation?

Seattle based blogger Tom Paulson reports about the articles devoted to the Gates Foundation published in the new issue of Alliance Magazine. He refers to Timothy Ogden's introduction that points out to the difficulty of honest feedback: under the headline Speaking truth to power, Ogden writes that it is increasingly difficult for anyone to speak truth to power at the Gates Foundation. We were surprised at the number of people who responded to our requests for submissions with some version of ‘I’d love to talk about that, but I don’t think it’s a good idea for me to comment publicly’.

Another job opening in Kampala for the WHO project of the African Tobacco Control Center

The deadline to apply for this position (12 months) as Project Officer for the African Tobacco Control Resource Center (ATCRC) is September 19. I wonder who are the Senior Project Officer and the Director mentioned in the ad. For some background about the project, this interview with Vinayak Prasad in 2010. The link to the previous ad, for a Tobacco Control Specialist with ATCRC (deadline September 15).

CTFK awards a $300K grant to the Association pour la Défense des Droits des Consommateurs (ADC) to promote tobacco control in 5 French speaking countries

The $300K grant is awarded to the Association pour la Défense des Droits des Consommateurs (ADC) based in Ndjamena (Chad). The countries involved are Chad, Niger, Burkina, Guinea and Mauritania. It looks like a continuation of a previous grant awarded in 2009 (until July 2011) to the same group to work in Chad, Niger, Burkina and Ivory Coast. As far as we know no report has been made public about what was achieved with the previous grant and how it was managed. Not much is available online about ADC. We found this article and the cyber-interview of Daouda ElDadj Adam by Pascal Bogui, published in 2007 on Pascal's blog (both documents in French).

African Tobacco Control Advocates on Facebook

Now on Facebook, 2 new pages: African Tobacco Control and  African Journalists Against Tobacco

Honest Feedback, Questions to the Gates Foundation

Honest Feedback, Questions to the Gates Foundation is a small book (80 pages) by Philippe Boucher, now available in paperback via the internet print on demand publisher Blurb.com and also as an e-book via Amazon-Kindle. Just click on Blurb or Kindle and get a copy.
Philippe Boucher -who also manages the blogs Tobacco Control in Africa and Vers une Afrique Sans Tabac- shares his thoughts about the promotion of tobacco control in Africa and the role played by the Bloomberg Initiative and the Gates Foundation. A rare independent point of view, as 'not many speak their mind to the Gates Foundation'. The book is dedicated to the Foundation's CEO, Jeff Raikes who calls regularly for honest feedback. See also this interview of Boucher.

 

Honest Feedback, Questions à la Fondation Gates

Honest Feedback est un petit livre (aussi en format e-book) que j'ai commis (en anglais seulement pour le moment) dans lequel j'exprime mes commentaires et mes suggestions sur la manière dont ont été et sont gérés les fonds substantiels investis par Michael Bloomberg et Bill Gates pour soutenir la promotion de la lutte anti-tabac en Afrique.

The Gates Foundation gives $18 million to the Bloomberg Family Foundation with a special emphasis on tobacco control in Africa

Visiting the site of the Gates Foundation for tobacco control projects (scroll on the right to recent grants), I found this information, without any additional detail (for now).

 Grantee: Bloomberg Family Foundation

Date: July 2011

Purpose: to reduce tobacco use in low and middle-income countries with priority focus on Africa

Amount: $18,000,000

Term: 2 years and 9 months

Topic: Tobacco

Region Served: Global

Program: Global Health

Grantee Location: New York, New York

Grantee Web site: Not available

Looking for a site I could not find any (yet). Here is the link to Bloomberg.org. I did leave them a message asking for more details.

 

Makerere University: Advert for a Tobacco Control Specialist

Here is the ad, as a Google doc. Deadline to apply: September 15, 2011 (3 year contract). The position is part of the WHO Africa initiative project. By the way, the ad on the CTFK website about a Director Africa position is still on. It was initially posted in March.

Euromonitor International studies the future of tobacco in Africa

Tih Armstrong has emailed us about a podcast posted on March 29 2011 by Euromonitor International (a market research firm) about the future of tobacco in Africa. It is worth listening to. For $2000 you can also obtain their most recent (August 2011) "global briefing" about tobacco perspectives in the Middle East and Africa.

Ghana must speed up legislation on tobacco

That's according to Patricia Lambert, during a special workshop in tobacco control in South Africa.

Ghana: a $15K grant for VISA from the Bloomberg Initiative

Tobacco Taxation Situational Report in Ghana

Vision for Alternative Development

To develop a tax report in Ghana with appropriate, FCTC-compliant tax policy recommendations that assist the Government of Ghana to follow through on its commitments to institute tax measures that reduce smoking.

Country: Ghana
Amount: $15,000
Start Date: Apr 2011
End Date: Jul 2011

 

Bill Gates in China: 'Say No to Involuntary Smoking"

Bill Gates participated to a press conference where he put on a green T-Shirt with the slogan: Say No to involuntary smoking. That was the first time he got involved with the issue since the launch of his $125 million gift with Mike Bloomberg on July 23 2008. As of today there is no post on his personal site.

WHO's performance to be independently evaluated?

An independent performance evaluation, reforms for more transparency and accountability? Read Margaret Chan's final speech at the General Assembly. The implementation of those goals is another story. What about detailing how the $9.9 million given by the Gates Foundation are used?

Winners of the 2011 World No Tobacco Day Awards in the African Region

Every year, WHO recognizes individuals or organizations from its six Regions for their accomplishments in the area of tobacco control such as research, capacity building, promotion of policy or legislation and advocacy to enhance tobacco control.

In the African Region, the World No Tobacco Day 2011 Award winners are:

• Associação para a Defesa do Consumidor, République du Cap Vert;
• Dr Dionko Maoundé, Conseiller juridique du Ministre de la Santé Publique, République du Tchad ;
• M. Ibrahima Sory Cisse, Président - Fondateur de GENERATION SANS TABAC, République de Guinée ;
• M. Haja Ramamonjisoa, Président de NY SAHY, République de Madagascar;
• M. Ebeh Adayade Kodjo, Directeur exécutif de l'Alliance Nationale des Consommateurs et de l’Environnement, République Togolaise ;
• Mr Killian Manyengawana, Graphic artist for Blue Africa LTD Company, Republic of Zimbabwe.

The six awardees were recognized for their outstanding contributions in their respective countries in the area of tobacco control.

Source: WHO-Africa

 

Rethoric Versus Reality: the best and worst of aid agency practices

This is a very interesting and worrying report (pdf format). It nails many UN agencies as performing very poorly as far as transparency, accountability and administrative costs are concerned. Too bad the Aid Watch blog is closing down.

Small grants are beautiful, but are there any?

This post is about the effectiveness of "small" grants ($5.000/$10.000 and under). What happened to small grants in the strategy of the present programs? 

American Cancer Society awarded $451,720 by the Gates Foundation (in October 2010)

Visiting the site of the Gates Foundation, I discover that the American Cancer Society was awarded in October 2010 a grant of $451,720, apparently relative to tobacco control in Africa. My guess is it was used (in part?) to fund the conference in Johannesburg. Was that a wise investment considering the Consortium (managed by ACS for $300K per year, $1.5 million total for 5 years) now tells us there is not enough money available to work with all African countries?

IDRC and tobacco control in Africa?

Visiting the IDRC's website I had found two projects concerning alternatives to tobacco growing in Kenya and in Zambia (see below). Here is a report by Dorcas Kiptui about Kenya . I did not find any information about the external evaluation report but I received a quick answer after an e-mail inquiry, providing me with the adequate link to the report. I found the content of the report disappointing but I did not have high expectations. What is IDRC doing now in Africa, beyond the two projects mentioned above, remains unclear. What happened (for instance) to the Rapid Response Fund project?

Madagascar: A grant to promote legislation, including graphic warnings

Visiting the site of the Bloomberg Initiative I discover this information about the grant awarded in October 2010 (until September 2012) to the National AntiTobacco Office in Madagascar for $96,669.

Tanzania: what future for tobacco control advocates?

This recent portrait of leading advocate Lutgard Kagaruki in the Tanzania Daily News raises the question of the future of local tobacco control advocacy when their international funding disappears (in this case funding from the Bloomberg Initiative). The article provides no answer.

Smile with this story from Paris about collecting cigarette butts

Posted on TreeHugger: A 22 Year Rids Paris of Cigarette Butts By Hand, Makes a Dress, and Saves the Rainforest

The African tobacco Control Consortium shrinks its ambitions, claims budgetary problems.

In an email distributed to tobacco control advocates ATCC refers to a 3 day "steering committee" meeting that took place one month ago in Lomé where the "major change" was decided: “We realized with great regret that with the money available through this grant, we simply can't have a significant impact in all 46 African countries." The email provides no information about the money available, how it is spent and why it took more than one year to figure this problem out. There is reference to a report published after the meeting but this document was not provided. The ATCC steering committee has decided to initially focus its efforts on a limited number of countries: Benin, Botswana, Cameroon, Congo Brazzaville, Gabon, the Gambia, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Uganda and Zambia. 

ATSA final report from the Johannesburg's conference: still many unanswered questions

A report (pdf format) about the Johannesburg's conference is available (only in English for now) on the site of the African Consortium. Our requests to know the budget of this conference that was funded by a special grant from the Gates Foundation have remained unanswered. Why is that when the grant funding another tobacco control conference is made public? Could we be shocked by the amount? The report does not provide any numbers or detailed budget about the various past and ongoing projects, nor a serious independent evaluation. While there has never been more money available to promote tobacco control in Africa one can still read that "funding is insufficient". Where is all the money going? Don't ask, don't tell. This practice seems very different from the principles recently stated by Bill Gates himself about transparency, cost-effectivenes assessment and impact evaluation.

Bill Gates priorities: total transparency, rigorous assessment of cost-effectiveness, impact evaluation

In this post on his blog Bill Gates explains how he is going to look for additional sources of financing for development and aid, including a Financial Transaction Tax (sometimes called Robin Hood Tax). He also writes:  I'll have three principles in mind throughout. The first is total transparency around all types of investments. The second is rigorous assessment of the cost-effectiveness of interventions, so we know we're getting value for money. The third is impact evaluation, so we are clear about results and can learn lessons and improve.

Why it matters that donors evaluate their work

From the Chronicle of Philanthropy at the Annual Global Philanthropy Forum Conference.

The "business" of international aid

An opinion published in the Wall Street Journal. 

ATCA: Elections to the Board (2011-2013) the results

ATCA's elected Board members are Issah Ali (President), Flore Ndembiyembe (Treasurer), Yussuf Saloojee, Patricia Lambert, Francisco Cabo, Inoussa Saouna and Aimé Ndamina (Association Burundaise de lutte contre le tabagisme). There are no news about the General Assembly approving (voting on) the Annual Report nor about presenting for approval financial documents like the annual audited financial report. According to ATCA's constitution an independent auditor is supposed to verify the financial accounts and the Treasurer is supposed to submit them for a vote of approval by the General Assembly.

Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids: Director for Africa

CTFK is looking for a Director for Africa (pdf).

Nigeria: the Senate passes the Nigerian Tobacco Control Bill

As explained in this post from the Nigeria National Tobacco Control Bill Bog, the legislative process is not over: "As it is now, the bill has only been passed by the Senate. It is to be sent to the House of Representatives which will hopefully pass it before it goes to Goodluck Jonathan for his assent."

Grants allocated by the Bloomberg Initiative to Ghana and Mozambique

Visiting the site where the Bloomberg Initiative lists the grants it has awarded, we find two grants we had not heard about: one for Ghana and one for Mozambique. Details below.

ATCA's commitment to transparency and accountability

ATCA's commitment to transparency and accountability is part of its constitution (pdf), starting with a mention in the section 4.6 devoted to Principles and Values (p.6): b) transparency c) accountability.
That translates into obligations that are detailed below.

Who's Who? The staff of the African Tobacco Control Consortium

The ATCC site lists the staff positions but does not provide the names or short bios of the persons in charge. Find below our attempt at more transparency by providing you with this information collected thanks to Google and various sources (like Linkedin).

IDRC: Accountability Tools for Policy Research

IDRC has funded this interesting project by One World Trust. It is about improving accountability and transparency. How much or how little IDRC implements those goals is debatable. 

ATCA: Elections to the Board (2011-2013)

There are 9 candidates for the 7 seats of the ATCA Board: 
Issah Ali (Ghana) is candidate for Chair and Flore Ndembiyembe (Cameroon and OTAF) for Treasurer. Among the outgoing members, 2 are not candidates for reelection: Rachel Kitonyo and Mohamed Sidi. There are 3 new candidates: Nelson Baziwelo Zakaju (Drug Fight Malawi), Inoussa Saouna (OTAF, SOS Niger and Present Chair of ATCRI), Aimé Ndamina (Association Burundaise de lutte contre le tabagisme). The other outgoing members are candidates for reelection. The voting process is taking place via the internet.

ATCC is looking for a few tobacco control good fellows

ATCC is looking for new leaders in tobacco control in the African countries that don't have any. The goal of this very interesting leadership program is to recruit and train such leaders. Read the description for the details. The document does not specify what countries are concerned. No need to apply if you are over 40 years old, the deadline anyway was February 28.

WHO: Dr. Margaret Chan's speech on the occasion of the 100th International Women's Day on 8th March 2011

Signaled by Mary Okioma, Executive Director of Women for Justice in Africa (Nairobi)

Address by Margraret Chan to WHO staff on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day (Geneva, Switzerland, 8 March 2011)

Colleagues, ladies and gentlemen,

In 1968, the Philip Morris tobacco company introduced Virginia Slims. This was a cigarette designed, packaged, and aggressively marketed to young professional women. The ads usually contrasted an old-fashioned sepia-tinted photo of household drudgery or women doing farm work with the image of a fashionable, liberated, young and, of course, very slim female smoker. The ad campaign was fabulously successful and its slogan became famous: You’ve come a long way, baby.

Gates Foundation: Jeff Raikes still concerned about getting feedback

From an article in the Chronicle of Philanthropy

Mr. Raikes also said the foundation is continuing to explore new ways to improve communication with grantees following a critical report last June in which many nonprofits complained that Gates is often unresponsive.

He said the foundation is working with the Center for Effective Philanthropy, the group that produced the report, to identify new avenues for eliciting feedback from grantees. Perhaps foundations could use online tools like Survey Monkey, which enable people to easily create and send out surveys, to engage with grantees, Mr. Raikes said.

“Our sector in general needs to put itself in a position of more continuous feedback loops,” he said.

African Tobacco Control Alliance: two year activities report (2009-2010)

The African Tobacco Control Alliance has published a report (pdf) about its activities since its creation in November 2008 in Durban. ATCA's Chair, Rachel Kitonyo, encourages ATCA's members are to read it and provide their feedback. As for now this document does not include any detailed information about the finances. Maybe it will become available later. How would ATCA rate on the Transparency Scorecard?

Indicators for a transparent management scorecard

Following up on the need for more transparency (and accountability) that has been at the core of this blog, I have listed 10 indicators that I believe would be helpful to assess how organizations are performing. Here they are:

1. Names, bios of the staff and contact email (program, project managers, all staff involved)
2. Detailed annual report explaining the activities
3. Detailed annual operational budget (easy to find and providing key info, see below)
4. Budget for staff and consultants (staff administrative costs)
5. Budget for travel and hospitality (including monthly update and yearly detailed list)
6. Transparency blog providing regular detailed information about the progress of each program/project/grant
7. Open selection process for grant applications (all applications available)
8. Transparency requirement for grantees and sub-grantees (including the 7 first items of this scorecard)
9. Establishment of a benchmark scorecard (baseline) for the project, updated yearly to allow evaluation
10. Willingness to answer questions and provide information (for big institutions, Access to Information person and procedure)

What do you think the score is for each organization involved in promoting tobacco control in Africa?