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Civil society organisation support

CSOs play a crucial part in immunisation and health care and so GAVI provides funding to help them in their work.


In many countries CSOs deliver 10-60% of immunisation services. GAVI's funding aims to strengthen CSOs and to encourage the public sector and civil society to work together to plan and deliver sustainable health care.

In 2009, GAVI commissioned a series of case studies to document the experiences of four countries with CSO funding support: Afghanistan, DR Congo, Ethiopia and Pakistan
Download the full report (PDF - 3MB)

CSOs have access to people who, for geographical, socioeconomic or cultural reasons, are the hardest to reach, often because they are beyond the reach of direct government services. For example, in Cambodia, 30-40% of routine immunisation is delivered by CSOs, 8-12% in Bangladesh and up to 40% in Ghana.

CSOs also mobilise populations to create demand for immunisation and other child health services, and provide technical assistance to national immunisation and child health programmes. They advocate to influence decision-makers, donors and the media. Within the framework of the Millennium Development Goals, Global Health Partnership engagement with CSOs is cited as a best practice in pursuit of national and community ownership and sustainability.

The GAVI Alliance invested US$30 million in two types of support for Civil Society:

  • Strengthening the coordination and representation of CSOs at country and regional levels. This is CSO type A support available to all GAVI countries that is currently being revised. The new guidelines will be announced in the Fall 2010 for applications.
  • Funding for CSOs in 10 pilot countries to help implement health system strengthening (HSS) plans or the comprehensive multi-year plan for immunisation (cMYP). This is CSO type B support in which GAVI supports 10 pilot countries. This is additional to existing funding streams to help these countries deliver their comprehensive multi-year plan for immunisation and implement health system strengthening proposals. This means it is integrated into the existing GAVI window for health system strengthening to allow a more harmonised, country-driven approach and avoids fragmenting support through multiple programme windows.

Currently, of the 10 Pilot countries Afghanistan, Burundi, DR Congo, Ethiopia, Ghana, Indonesia, and Pakistan have successfully applied for this funding. Bolivia, Georgia, and Mozambique still qualify for application.

Download Guidelines for GAVI Alliance CSO Support (PDF - 460K)