New partnership to address neglected areas of sexual and reproductive health and rights in sub-Saharan Africa

ANeSA, previously known as ANSRHRA, is a seven-year CAD29.9-million initiative co-funded by IDRC (CAD5 million), the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CAD7.5 million) and Global Affairs Canada (CAD 17.5 million). It will fund up to 16 Implementation Research Teams (IRTs) and two Health Policy and Research Organizations (HPROs).

At the 79th Session of the UN General Assembly in New York, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced over CAD200 million to support projects, including ones that will advance the SRHR of women and girls. Canada’s funding for ANeSA was included in this announcement.

The African Health Economics and Policy Association will be the HPRO working with IRTs in West and Central Africa, and the African Population and Health Research Center will serve as the HPRO for IRTs in East and Southern Africa. A first call for up to eight IRTs was issued on March 18, 2024. The selection process for the IRTs is in progress. A second call for up to another eight IRTs is planned for 2026.

Innovative and gender-transformative solutions

There is a strong and growing need and desire for governments and civil society organizations in Africa to come together to improve outcomes related to critical areas of SRHR. However, meaningful change remains slow.

Progress is impeded by the impacts of emerging and existing infectious diseases, such as COVID-19, and the direct and indirect effects of climate change on already weak health systems, leading to increased demand for sexual and reproductive health services but also new and increasing barriers to availability and access to services. As a result, neglected health issues are even further neglected.  

ANeSA’s primary objective is to support greater realization of neglected SRHR areas by underserved populations in Africa. This partnership will generate and promote the use of high-quality evidence on sustainable, scalable interventions to transform service design and delivery; strengthen the development and implementation of policies and legal instruments; and contribute to building equitable and sustainable health systems to address the intersecting challenges facing underserved populations in Africa.

This ambitious agenda requires multistakeholder collaboration. The IRTs, comprising researchers, decision-makers and representatives of civil society organizations, will integrate gender-transformative approaches within implementation research. The aim is to improve access to family planning and contraceptive services; expand access to safe abortion care where legally permitted and post-abortion care; uphold SRHR and ensure access to services for adolescents, including comprehensive sexuality education; support efforts to prevent SGBV and improve services for people experiencing it; and strengthen advocacy for SRHR.

The HPROs —one for East and Southern Africa and one for West and Central Africa — will support the IRTs by facilitating networking and learning, nurturing a community of practice, and promoting knowledge mobilization and exchange across the full spectrum of knowledge users, including decision-makers. The HPROs will also contribute to strengthening the capacity of research teams to generate evidence on the implementation and use of evidence-informed gender-transformative SRHR interventions, and to increasing demand for such evidence and promotion of gender equitable SRHR by decision-makers.

Learn more about ANeSA on our initiative page.