Tobacco Control in Africa - TCA

Revisiting the Gates Foundation's pages devoted to tobacco control

While the Gates Foundation has invested millions of dollars since 2008 to promote tobacco control I could find only 3 press releases, the most recent one on April 12, 2010. How is that for transparency or rather lack of, quasi-total opacity? There is no global report available that would detail what/who has been funded and with what results during all those years. Googling a bit more, I found a 2014 press release of November 19, 2014 posted on the ACBF site (see below). Anything else?

As the end of the granting period approaches for the $32 million awarded by the Gates Foundation in 2014

As the end of the 3 year granting period approaches for most of the $32 million awarded by the Gates Foundation in 2014, we have revisited the sites of various grantees. We have found little about what was done. As for now there does not look like there is -yet- a synthetic and detailed evaluation. Where were those S32 million invested? How exactly were the $8.5 million to ACBF used? What surveys were developed by the CDC Foundation for $4.5? What about the rest, ie $18.5 million? How much for WHO? What else? Any ideas? Here is the link to our initial post on this mega-grant, where Cynthia Lewis explained their intent. She did mention a demand for more transparency. We certainly agree but how is it going to apply to those grants and what's next?

 

 

Is the Bloomberg Initiative-Campaign forTobacco-Free-Kids still funding projects in Africa?

According to their map of grants, as visited today, they are not. Or they just need to update the map? Or they don't care sharing this information any more? We asked them repeatedly about it. To no avail. Yet.

Gates Foundation: Senior Program Officer, Africa - Francophone Job

Could this job (application reproduced below) also include prompting tobacco control? That could help.

The more things change: Annual coordination workshop for ACBF's sub-grantees in Harare, September 28 - October 2

Is it really necessary and useful to move all those people to Harare? What's the cost of such an "annual coordination workshop"? The "rationale"? The workshop aims to equip the sub-grantees with knowledge and skills in ACBF procedures for effective and efficient grant utilization and management. Funded by the Bill & Melinda  Gates Foundation, the tobacco control project advances evidence-based tobacco control policies in Africa.

The opaque transparency of the Gates Foundation

Revisiting the website of the ACBF we discover this press release from the Gates Foundation dated November 19, 2014 announcing continued support for tobacco control in Africa. BUT, while this text lists the organizations the Foundation is partnering with, it does not provide any $ figure about the budgets awarded to each of them. At the same time, Cynthia Lewis writes:
You asked for more transparency in grant making, better role clarity and coordination among partners and grant makers, and direct investment in a strategic African organization that can help build capacity.
The problem (as we see it) is that she does not provide any detailed information besides the names of the 'intermediaries". Visiting, for instance, the CTFK site we were unable (as of today) to find any reference to a grant awarded in 2015 to an African country. As for the grant awarded to ACBF, we don't know it's size nor is there much detail about how it is going.

(After some more investigating we found that the ABCF grant seems to be for $8.5M, while the grant for surveys by the CDC Foundation would be $4.6M: that still leaves $18.5M unaccounted for -how much for CTFK? how much for WHO?- and there is very little detail about how all those amounts are going to be used. We should not have to go looking : why isn't all the info given upfront? That would be real transparency).

Cynthia also mentions that: As you know, we are also supporting some social marketing and behavior change work against tobacco use in Africa as a complement to important and ongoing policy work.
Well, we don't know about that. What is it about?

CTCA Phase 2 (2015 -2017): 5 target countries

Details here

$32 million to implement tobacco control programs

The press release posted on the ACBF website is below. Details remain very sketchy on how this budget will be managed. There is reference to a communiqué by the Gates Foundation but we were unable to find it. 12 countries appear to have been selected for funding. What about the rest? How much information will be made public? The the three year and $32 million grant was announced in July 2014 on the ACBF site. ACBF nor the Gates Foundation answered our requests for more details.

ACBF & Gates Foundation partners lay groundwork for next phase of tobacco control  

       

Harare, Zimbabwe

25 Nov, 2014

The African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF), the World Health Organization (WHO) and Campaign for Tobacco Free kids (CTFK) are advancing coordination of the Tobacco Control Project across Africa funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The three Gates Foundation partners met from the 24^th-25^th of November and agreed that coordination and effective implementation of tobacco control will take a prominent place in the second phase of the project.

During the two day sessions, the partners agreed on an effective mechanism for work at country level, developed a joint reporting tool and agreed to develop a monthly calendar of key activities as well as to hold regular calls to discuss their plans and progress at country and regional levels.  

The meeting served as a platform for the partners to gain a better appreciation of each organization's role in tobacco control; share work plans and deliverables as well as priority countries of focus and partners at country and regional levels.

ACBF, as the host of the first coordination meeting, recommended that the partners build their relationship for tobacco control based on trust, transparency and communication. They were also encouraged to build on each other’s comparative advantage and competence. These outcomes will ensure coordination for effective implementation of tobacco control in Africa by avoiding duplication of activities and mismanagement of resources.

Last week, the Gates Foundation officially released a communiqué announcing their commitment of more than US $32 million to support governments and Civil Society Organizations to implement tobacco control policies and programs in order to reduce tobacco use.

Under this funding, ACBF will support strategic grant-making and capacity building of the Centre for Tobacco Control in Africa,  the University of Cape Town and Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) to advance evidence-based Tobacco Control policies in Africa including tobacco taxation, advertising bans, graphic warning labels, and smoke-free environments. The CSOs will be drawn from Uganda, Kenya, Mauritania, Botswana, Ethiopia, Senegal, Nigeria, and Ghana, Niger, Benin, Gabon and the Gambia.

That's five "big' countries (Nigeria, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Ghana), two 'medium" Niger and Senegal, 5 small (Mauritania, Botswana, Benin, Gabon).

Representing ACBF were Bakary Kone and Patience Jambaya (as seen on the pictures)

 

November 24-25: Coordination for effective Tobacco Control in Africa, in Harare.

I found this by chance while doublechecking the information provided on the Gates Foundation site. There is still no mention of the amount of the grant awarded to the ABCF which is strange as usually (apparently) they disclose the amount involved. It was on the site of ABCF. Is this meeting really necessary? How transparent is it going to be? How much will it cost? For what results? What do all the other local/national advocates really think? What chance do they have to be heard? Who is in charge of the project at ABCF?

November 24- 25     

Coordination for effective Tobacco Control in Africa 

Harare, Zimbabwe

The tobacco control partner coordination meeting will be held in Harare at the African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF) secretariat on 24th to 25th November 2014. Three institutions namely; ACBF, WHO (AFRO and Headquarters) and the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids (CTFK) will meet to discuss how to improve coordination for Tobacco Control in Africa under the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation funding for Africa.

Susan Desmond-Hellman: The Gates Foundation needs more transparency

The Chronicle of Philanthropy tells us about a talk delivered by Susan Desnond-Hellman where shew mentions the need for more transparency and listening to feedback. We wish this would not be only wishful thinking as far as the grants awarded by the Gatews Foundation to promote tobacco control in Africa are concerned.  but a very small part of the Foundation's activity but why should they be exempt of the transparency requirement?

What are foundations for?

A critical analysis of the role of 'Big Philanthropy' and democracy. By Gara LaMarche in Democracy.

What's left of the promotion of tobacco control in Africa by The Gates Foundation? Not much

Visiting the site of the ACBF (African Capacity Building Foundation) that was awarded a 3 year grant (amount not available) one can see that the scope of the interventions has been drastically reduced, focusing on the CTCA and the University of Cape Town. Only six countries are 'targeted': Botswana, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal and Uganda. 0 information about this grant is available on the site of the Gates Foundation (that I could find). The more it changes... It's sad to see such a waste.
The prospects don't look much better from the Bloomberg Initiative/CTFK where I have not seen any new grant recently awarded. When there is no clear strategy and no real leadership...

What communication strategy for promoting tobacco control in Africa? Can the African Media Initiative be part of it?

Here is an ad for a communications officer position with the Gates Foundation. How do you think tobacco control could/should be part of this job? What could/should be a global communication strategy to promote tobacco control in Africa? How could tobacco control be part of the African Media Initiative who just got a new CEO, Eric Chinje?

About the evaluation of the African Tobacco Control Consortium/ACS grant/project and what's next?

During a meeting a year ago in Dakar the existence of an evaluation of the ATCC/ACS grant by consultants for the Gates Foundation was mentioned but without any additional information. While we still don't know the details of the evaluation we found out, one year later, about its authors: EnCompass LLC of Washington DC, a group that also helped WHO design the Kampala based CTCA and is in charge of its evaluation (see below). As the fate of the Consortium looks uncertain, what's next? What happened to the RFQ posted in November by the Gates Foundation? Contacted, the Gates Foundation did not reply. As usual, everything remains secret.

How to waste $100 millon+

From the New Yorker, the story about the $100 million+ grant Mark Zuckerberg spent to improve schools in Newark and how it failed.

 

 

The case for philanthropy criticism?

From The Atlantic, a very touchy subject, especially when you depend on philantropic funding. Does it apply to tobacco control funding in Africa? Does anybody dare expressing any wish for changes, ask for public evaluation and transparency? But of course, speaking out can bring personal negative consequences, as explained in this opinion in Chronicle of Philanthropy.

Philamplify: honest feedback to improve philanthropy

Philamplify is an interesting initiative by the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy to promote honest feedback to improve philanthropy. As for now it does not seem to include international projects but it is still worth examining.

Voluntourism?

Do Tobacco Control Advocates succumb to voluntourism (as discussed in the New York Times). In our internet age I often wonder about the real use of many (costly) trips/meetings under the pretense of helping out. Of course there are always great group pictures, but what else?

Thanguy NZUE OBAME about the new Tobacco Control Law in Gabon

Below is the text (in French) of a cyber-interview with Thanguy NZUE OBAME, about the adoption of a Tobacco Control law in Gabon. It provides additional details to our previous post (in English only). Very interestingly article 48 of this law proposes to award 2% of the tobacco taxes to fund tobacco control activities. If adequately implemented such a budget would be extremely valuable and effective (see question 8) as most of the time no regular funding is provided. The choice of 2% is an improvement upon the goal mentioned (never implemented) in the article 6 of the 1988 European Charter Against Tobacco, "impose a levy of at least 1% of of tobacco cotx revenue to fund specific tobacco control and health promotion activities".

Ibrahim Index of African Governance

"Best and worst" countries according to the Ibrahim Index of African Governance.

Veteran's Day: what about looking back at the most recent battles in the tobacco war and discussing about the future?

As you can see from the most recent posts I have started to look at what happened in the past, especially since 2007/2008 when philanthropists Bloomberg and Gates provided millions of dollars that changed the face of tobacco control and I am wondering about what's next, especially, very concretely what is the Gates Foundation going to decide as they look for an organization to promote tobacco control in Africa for the next 3 years. I have a feeling of déja vu and fait accompli while at the very same time hoping for a change, a new practice in the process of grant management, engaging the whole community, including potential 'dissenters'. Making this wish I am only taking the word of CEO Jeff Raikes when he described his '3Ts priorities' in the speech he gave in Belfast in June 2012.
I have a few ideas about encouraging everybody to pitch in, share their personal evaluation of what happened since 2007/08 and offer suggestions/wishes for the next 3 years. Stay tuned.

Jeff Raikes about Philanthropy, Technology, Transparency and Teamwork.

Here is the whole text of the conference given by Jeff Raikes on June 5, 2012. Read it all and especially the parts at the end devoted to Transparency and Teamwork. I have reproduced the text below for 'safekeeping' because my experience has been that sometimes links were broken, texts were deleted and the original material was lost. Yes this also happened on the website of the Gates Foundation and for information about the tobacco control grants. 

 

Tobacco Control Journalism Fellowship in Nigeria funded by CTFK

Here is one announcement but where are the articles? Where is the beef? There are no details about the $ amount of each award and there is no mention (apparently) of any radio project while radio broadcast remains a dominant medium in Africa. Another copycat reprint of the press release that does not provide any additional information.

Regional Workshop on Policy Coordination for Tobacco Control to Address TC Coordination Challenges 16-18 October 2013 Kigali

The countries that  participated are: Ethiopia, Eritrea, Guinea, Guinea Equatorial, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritius, Mozambique, Rwanda, Seychelles, Swaziland, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe. My question is: how were those countries selected? why? by whom? How much did the workshop cost? What about a cybermeeting instead of moving all those people? Information published by CTCA

Workshop for journalists in Ouagadougou

Sylviane Ratte continues to travel around the African continent. The journalists invited to this workhop in Ouagadougou seem happy but how many articles or radio programs did they produce, for what investment? Is this a cost effective way to produce tobacco control content in the media? What about paying them directly to produce content? How much is spent on travel and hospitality that could be invested in writing stipends?

Did the Gates Foundation evaluate the African Tobacco Control Consortium?

In the report about the May 15 meeting in Dakar devoted to the future of tobacco control advocacy in Africa (still only available in French?) there is a presentation by Patrick Musavuli entitled: "Report of the evaluation on the ATCC project by the Gates Consultants and about the future of tobacco control advocacy in Africa", «Compte-rendu de l’évaluation des Consultants de GATES sur le projet ATCC, et sur l’avenir de la lutte antitabac en Afrique ». Unfortunately the summary does not provide any information about this "Gates evaluation", who did it, when nor if it is meant to be shared or kept confidential.

Angola: CTCA organizes a 'tobacco control capacity assessment' July 15-19

From reading the CTCA site we learn that 'a tobacco control capacity assessment exercise is currently under way in Angola to help the government identify the country’sability to implement  tobacco control, based on the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO FCTC).  The assessment is jointly carried out by the government of Angola with technical support from the World Health organization, ( WHO) and  the Centre for Tobacco Control in Africa  ( CTCA).

Fabrice EBEH's presentation in Dakar (May 15) during the What future for tobacco control in Africa meeting.

Below is the summary of the presentation of Fabrice EBEH (in French 'Rapport Consultation ONG') with our translation (in English) of the main points (in yellow) with our comments (in light blue). Considering the content of Rachel Kitonyo's presentation all does not seem as well as Fabrice's summary seems to imply.

Rachel Kitonyo's presentation in Dakar (May 15) during the What future for tobacco control in Africa meeting, including our comments and questions

What to retain of Rachel's presentation (as it is summarized below in French -as the report in only available in French for now- with our partial translation in English of what we consider the key points, colored in yellow with our comments in italics and colored in pale blue).
As diplomatic and vague as the presentation is summarized, it does raise a significant number of issues about how the program was/is managed. How can the apparently badly needed changes be implemented? Or is everything going to remain the same?

Rachel Kitonyo to leave the Consortium by June 30

Rachel Kitonyo, ATCC's Programs Director, shares this information in an email (see below) received yesterday. It raises (at least for us) a few questions as Rachel had been very instrumental in the creation and management of the Consortium. How will this departure impact the management of ATCC? That remains to be seen as well as the potential changes that could occur following the still mysterious 'evaluation' made by Gates Foundation's advisors as mentioned briefly in the report ( see page 6, only in French for now) about the May 15 meeting "What future for tobacco control in Africa" that took place in Dakar. Rachel's presentation at this meeting is summarized on page 5 and 6.

What is the management overhead for the grants awarded to promote tobacco control in Africa?

This recent article about overhead at big charities invites the question about the management overhead. For instance, what is ACS doing for their apparent very substantial share  ($1.5 million+?) of the Gates Foundation grant ($7 to 8 million)?

FCA trains African NGOs in shadow reporting

See the information as posted on the site of the FCTC about the shadow report training that took place in Dakar on March 7-8, 2013.

One more big meeting: is it the most effective strategy?

ACS + WHO Afro and all the usual main donor organizations have brought together representatives of 22 countries to share their tobacco control experience and expertise. They met for 2 days. What was achieved? At what cost? What was achieved at the various previous similar meetings? Is this the most effective strategy? When will the next meeting take place? At what cost? With what results? Beside a significant budget for travel and hospitality?

Feedback remains a keyword for Bill Gates

Feedback remains a keyword for Bill Gates, here in this opinion for the Wall Street Journal. But how does it apply (if it does) to the tobacco control grants? Here the comment from Humanosphere.

The budget awarded by the Gates Foundation to ACS-Consortium increases again

When we last looked at the budget (in December 2011) it was $7.8788.847. As of today it is $8.015.471, an increase of $130.624.

Still no detailed information about how this grant is used.

Evaluation of the tobacco control programs in Africa?

A meeting has taken place in Atlanta at the end of October to look into evaluating tobacco control programs in Africa? Quis custodiet ipsos custodies? Any guarantee of an independent process? ie not having the funders and the people receiving the money self-evaluating themselves? Any hint of the creation of objective benchmarks and a simple scorecard like the one adopted for the EU in 2007?

Gates Foundation and New Venture Fund: from $1,329,671 to $4,163,671

After visiting the Bloomberg Initiative's site I decided to visit as well the Gates Foundation's site in case there was anything new. Indeed there was. I had mentioned earlier a grant awarded by GF to the New Venture Fund that mentioned tobacco control in Africa. When revisiting the page devoted to this grant it appears that the amount has significantly increased: it's now $4,163,671 instead of $1,329,671.
All the rest remains identical and I could not find any additional information about what's it's all about. Just millions floating around. Philanthrocapitalism at work. Any reason to complain or be surprised?

Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids is looking for an Executive Assistant, Africa Programs

Just posted on Idealist.org

Grant makers and media

This article is about the situation in the US but what about the situation in Africa and more precisely what is the grant makers strategy to raise the visibility and awareness about tobacco control issues in African countries/media? Do they even have one? Shouldn't they have one considering the millions involved? Subsidiary question: who is aware of the most recent grant awarded by the Gates Foundation for innovative programs in Africa? Do you know where to look?

Workshops in South Africa

ACS (with Gates Foundation funding) organized two workshops. One for Botswana advocates and one for "emerging researchers". I am not sure about how cost effective they are. Another post on the ACS blog looks at cancer care in Togo: we have nothing.

Supporting African Journalists Who Report About Tobacco Control?

This article explains how US foundations fund journalists. The Gates Foundation is one of them. In 2008 a reflexion was started about how to support journalists willing to report about tobacco control issues in their country. The most effective way would be to directly compensate journalists for the documents they produce. Such contracts could be designed so that the various aspects of the MPOWER strategy are covered. How about giving it a try? The rate? $100 per story (would have to include at least one picture) and a $100 monthly bonus for the best segment. The rythm? one story per month with a precise deadline. Please let us stop the expensive capacity building workshops and let us directly pay the journalists to produce content for everybody to see.

CTCA performance review

One more supermeeting involving plenty of dignitaries (30 "global tobacco control advocates") coming to Kampala from far away: at what cost and with what impact? Beyond the announcement (below) we have found zero substantial information about this meeting. The CTCA's site does not contain any (yet) nor the others. After this comment was posted we received a pdf document that provides a little more information, but not much. For instance, no detailed financial data are provided. Not that any of the other group is very transparent about their finances, but that would be a step in the right direction as far as transparency and public accountability are concerned.

Message of Ebeh Kodjo about 2011 and 2012: what is the real financial situation for ATCA and the African Consortium?

In a short email message dated December 19, Ebeh Kodjo states that "2012 will not be easy. It will be challenging, annoying, with less money and more demands." Unfortunately he does not provide any hard numbers about ATCA or the Consortium's finances for 2011 or 2012. His apparent pessimism about money seems inconsistent with the information available that seems to point toward increased resources.

From $7 million to $7,884,847: the amount of the grant awarded in 2009 by the Gates Foundation to the African Consortium has increased by 12.64%.

While the initial amount awarded in 2009 was $7 million, the amount now mentioned on the Foundation's site is $7,884,847 (+12.64%). It's good news, but how and why this increase? Does it represent the interests of the invested money?

Relevé chronologique des subventions accordées depuis 2007 dans les pays francophones

Avec l'arrivée de la fin de l'année 2011, nous avons effectué un relevé des principaux financements accordés depuis 2007 à la lutte contre le tabagisme en Afrique francophone par l'Initiative Bloomberg ($1.437.146) et la Fondation Gates ($907.158) pour un total de $2.344.304
Il conviendrait d'ajouter à ces sommes les crédits obtenus pas l'OTAF, les "petites" subventions de la FCA et de l'ACS (avant la création du Consortium), les subventions de la Norwegian Cancer Society.

Studying tobacco control laws in Africa

Visiting the tobacco control laws website initiated by the International Legal Consortium of the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids I find analyses of the existing legislation of a few countries (5) but not the texts themselves. Maybe local advocates could provide the original texts so everybody can access them?

About how the Gates Foundation partners with journalists

Here is an interesting post by Reuters blogger Felix Salmon. I wish the Gates Foundation would realize that compensating African journalists to write stories (and produce radio shows as radio is such an important medium in Africa) about tobacco control would be the most cost effective way to raise the awareness and support advocacy about those issues.

Tobacco Control in Africa: People, Politics and Politicies, a personal opinion

In his foreword, Dr. Akinkugbe talks of a "magnus opus, a monumental work", while for Evan Blecher, it "sets new standards for tobacco control research on the continent".
Written by IDRC's grantees, published (paid for) by IDRC, this is an hymn to IDRC: self-inflated, self-congratulatory, self-serving, it conveniently ignores the many problems and failures linked to the ATSA program. Considering the amounts invested, the final result is incredibly small and of very limited use. A very inconvenient and unacceptable assessment for all those who were/are part of the IDRC system. The book is a PR smokescreen for a very defective and wasteful project.

Smoke-free spaces in Africa growing at a snail’s pace

Smoke-free spaces in Africa growing at a snail’s pace (from FCTC's site)

The answer from the European Commission about our request for information: the announced contract is not yet signed

I received yesterday an email from Mr Thomas Kirchner (see below the content). He explains that "this contract does not yet exist. It is currently under preparation and foreseen to be signed before the end of this year." Therefore there are no documents available. I remain interested in a detailed breakdown of the budget as what was provided raised a certain number of questions that have not been answered. As for an eventual commitment to detailed communication and transparency, the eventual requirements seem limited but one should wait until one can see the actual contract. Mr Kirchner concludes: "Within EuropeAid, Unit D4 (Education, Health, Research and Culture) is in charge of this contract with the WHO and will be available to assist you should you require further clarifications. The Head of Unit responsible is Elisabeth Feret."