South Africa -  IOM will today sign a cooperation agreement with the Royal Dutch Embassy in Maputo, Mozambique, to provide funding worth EUR11.1 million for a four-year project dealing with sexual and reproductive health in migration-affected areas of southern Africa.

IOM, Save the Children Netherlands and Witwatersrand School of Public Health – which combined to form the SRHR-HIV Knows No Borders Consortium – are collaborating to improve sexual and reproductive health and HIV (SRH-HIV)-related outcomes among migrants (including migrant adolescents, young people and sex workers), as well as non-migrant beneficiaries and others living in migration-affected communities in six countries in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region.

The project: Improving SRHR-HIV Outcomes for Migrants, Adolescents and Young People and Sex Workers in Migration-Affected Communities in Southern Africa, will be implemented under the umbrella of the Partnership on Health and Mobility in Eastern and Southern Africa (PHAMESA), a bi-regional health programme managed from Pretoria, South Africa.

Aimed at contributing to the greater freedom of choice for the target populations regarding their sexuality, the project will focus on: demand creation for SRHR-HIV services; facilitating supply of and accessibility to responsive sexual and reproductive health and HIV services; and creating an enabling environment.

Dr. Erick Ventura, IOM’s Regional Migration Health Coordinator for Southern Africa, said: “The project is conscious of the need to facilitate a sustainable response to sexual and reproductive health and migration. By using an integrated, inclusive, space-based approach, the consortium will capitalize on synergies and strengthen already existing partnerships in project planning and implementation. Through the strong partnership network we expect to shift how government and civil society institutions and communities in all the six countries’ response to migrants’ needs.”

The project will be implemented along two recognized migration corridors.

         Labour migration corridor to South Africa – pulling migrants from Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, and Zambia.
         Infrastructure/transport corridor where infrastructure development and growing transport links are impacting on human mobility – Mozambique, Malawi and Zambia.

“The Dutch Embassy is proud to work with IOM and is looking forward to jointly achieving a common agenda to make sure we leave no one behind,” said Dutch Ambassador to Mozambique Pascalle Grotenhuis.

IOM, as the lead agency, is accountable for overall implementation, financial management, reporting to the donor, coordination and donor liaison, both at regional and national levels. Based on IOM’s mandate and experience, it will focus on engagement with Member States, SADC, UNAIDS, UNHCR, UNFPA and other key migration-focused partners, and will specifically implement activities’ reaching migrants, sex workers/clients and their communities.

For further information please contact Dr. Erick Ventura at IOM Pretoria. Tel: +278246800, Email: eventura@iom.int