At the beginning of May, 2012, a national road map on political dialogue in the health sector was signed by local and international partners including the EU and the WHO.

Susanne Bauer and Andrew Aitken recently travelled to Togo to support the implementation of the national health plan in the local districts during a tailor made training on Stakeholder Dialogues with district and national health representatives. They worked for four intensive days with a group of dynamic and highly qualified doctors, medical professionals, and representatives from international organizations who all were eager to explore what the main goal of the seminar was about: to support the EU/WHO project on policy dialogue in the health sector, currently being implemented in 3 pilot countries (Sierra Leone, Liberia and Togo). This EU/WHO project is spearheading the development and implementation of the national health plan in Togo, a plan developed in dialogue with all the stakeholders in the health sector.

It became clear during the workshop how important the initial engagement process would be in guaranteeing that both local actors and the local representatives of the organizations that signed the compact would proceed with its implementation. One main supporting factor was the initial “container” build during the course, these stakeholders will now have a common ground to begin the challenging process which lies ahead. This was reconfirmed when the Minister of Health joined-in to stress Togo’s commitment during the last day of our workshop, in cooperation with the local European Union delegation.

Read more about this on our blog.