Project profile — Reaching the Poorest: Quality Sexual and Reproductive Health Services in Mozambique

• Mozambique (100.00%)

• Population policy and administrative management:
Population policy and administrative management (13010) (8.00%)
Reproductive health care (13020) (30.00%)
Family planning (13030) (55.00%)
Personnel development for population and reproductive health (13081) (7.00%)

• Gender equality (significant objective)
• Environmental sustainability (cross-cutting) (not targeted)
• Participatory development and good governance (not targeted)
• Trade development (not targeted)
• Biodiversity (not targeted)
• Climate change mitigation (not targeted)
• Climate Change Adaptation (not targeted)
• Urban issues (not targeted)
• Desertification (not targeted)
• Children's issues (principal objective)
• Youth Issues (principal objective)
• Disaster Risk Reduction(DRR) (not targeted)
• Indigenous Issues (not targeted)
• Disability (not targeted)
• Nutrition (not targeted)
• ICT as a tool for development (not targeted)

The project aims to improve the quality of sexual and reproductive health services for 62,000 adolescent boys and girls (between the ages of 10 and 19 years) in and out of school. It is designed to address the social, cultural, and gender barriers faced by adolescents and promote cultural and behavioural change within communities in the districts of Milange, Morrumbala, and Derre in Zambézia province. Project activities include: (1) providing gender-sensitive and adolescent-friendly information about sexual and reproductive health and rights and related services in schools, health centers and communities, reaching up to 50,000 community members (of which 30,000 are women); (2) promoting community engagement and raising awareness around traditional adolescent initiation rites; and (3) supporting Children’s Parliaments, a platform where children and youth are able to share their views to the government and other key stakeholders.

The expected outcomes of this project include: (1) improved equitable access to high quality gender-sensitive adolescent sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) services and information for rural adolescent girls and boys in health facilities, primary schools, and communities; (2) enhanced use of gender-sensitive adolescent-friendly SRHR services and information in health facilities, primary schools and communities by rural adolescent girls and boys, through training community change agents and facilitators of initiation rites on adolescent SRHR and gender equality; and (3) reduced gender-based discrimination in the implementation of health policies at provincial and district levels for equitable access of adolescent girls and boys to quality SRHR services and information.

Results achieved as of March 2020 include: (1) equality assessments were completed in 43 schools to identify barriers for children in equitable access to schools; (2) 39 health service providers received training on how to provide adolescent-friendly and gender-sensitive sexual and reproductive health services and information, thus reducing barriers faced by adolescent girls and boys in accessing high-quality health services, including contraceptives; and (3) 12,128 girls and 10,800 boys between the ages of 10 and 19 were able to access adolescent friendly sexual and reproductive services at health facilities and schools.

• Proactive disclosure