East Central and Southern Africa Health Community (ECSA-HC) in collaboration with NEPAD Agency successfully conducted joint country consultations to Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia to collect critical information and country expectations for the development of the Southern Africa Tuberculosis and Health Systems Support (SATBHSS) project website and country sub-portals.
The aim of the consultations was to coordinate the development and operationalization of the SATBHSS project website and country sub-portals, and conduct a needs assessment to gather user expectations data. This exercise is in accordance with implementation of project component on operational research and knowledge sharing and was conducted between 16 and 29 August 2017. Prior to the consultations, countries were requested to nominate focal persons responsible for Information Technology (IT) and Communication with the aim of creating a database of the key personnel that will be responsible for managing and updating country sub-portals to ensure regional learning and knowledge sharing.
The nominated candidates were able to provide comprehensive feedback and expectations on both the website and country sub-portals. The feedback which ECSA-HC and NEPAD Agency has recorded will be consolidated in readiness for presentation to the web-developers at a kick-off meeting in Arusha, Tanzania scheduled for September 2017.
The identified focal persons shall also be very beneficial in activities that have been planned in the future regarding communication, advocacy and outreach at country and regional level. The SATBHSS project knowledge portal is strategic in the implementation of the project to ensure knowledge is captured, shared and used as learning lessons as well as best practice at national and regional level. ECSA-HC and NEPAD Agency will oversee the development of the project knowledge portal and provide support to the project countries to effectively utilize their country sub-portals to support the achievement of SATBHSS project objectives.
