Contract Signing Ceremony with Japanese Organization for International Organization in Family Planning (JOICFP) for the Grant Assistance for Japanese NGO Projects by the Government of Japan (Promotion of Women’s Health throughout the Life Cycle at One-Stop Service Site in Zambia, Phase Three)

          On 28th January, H.E. Mr. MIZUUCHI Ryuta, Ambassador of Japan to the Republic of Zambia, and Ms. GOTO Kumiko, General Project Manager of Japanese Organization for International Cooperation in Family Planning (JOICFP), signed a grant contract amounting to up to 331,087 United States Dollars, for the implementation of a project of the Grant Assistance for Japanese NGO Projects for “Promotion of Women’s Health throughout the Life Cycle at One-Stop Service Site (OSSS) in Zambia (Phase Three)”. The contract covers the final year of the three-year development cooperation project targeting 16 areas of Masaiti, Mpongwe and Lufwanyama district in Copperbelt Province.

          Through this project, JOICFP will continue to operate OSSSs which consist of a maternity waiting house and a youth centre in order to improve access to health services by all women in the targeted areas, including pregnant women and teenage girls. JOICFP will also conduct capacity building of the staff of Health Offices and those responsible for health and medical services in the districts, so that they may appropriately train members of Safe Motherhood Action Groups (SMAGs) and Peer Educators (PEs) to improve the quality of their activities.

          In the third year of the project, JOICFP aims to ensure its activities taken over in a sustainable manner to the health staff and local communities in the project area, by strengthening various follow-up training programs for them. JOICFP will also plan to conduct a survey and analysis on the effect of its project to date, in order to share the result analysis to Zambian health sector. It is expected that this JOICFP’s effort will further promote the health sector to utilize JOICFP’s project as a model of promotion of reproductive health including maternal and child health in Zambia.

          To read the speech by Ambassador Mizuuchi at this ceremony, please click here.