Funding of occupational health development in Southern Africa – Whose Agenda?

Funding of occupational health programmes in southern Africa is largely derived from two sources: the national fiscus of many countries, and from international donor aid. International agencies such as the World Health Organisation, the International Labour Organisation, as well as national governmental aid agencies within European countries, such as Sweden, Finland, Denmark and the United Kingdom, have a long tradition of supporting occupational health capacity development. Since the mid-nineties region-wide capacity development programmes had been implemented by the Fogarty International Center of the US National Institutes of Health and by the Swedish International Development Agency. The impacts of the funding, and the sustainability of these programmes have yet to be assessed.

Most programmes focus on short term returns, rather than long term development or sustainability because agencies generally have their own individual missions and implementing organisations are driven by funders to show short-term success, thus long term infrastructural development has a lower priority.

The “Paris Agenda” aimed to harmonise external aid and align it to national priorities, for support to developing countries. This has had a negative effect on supported occupational health programmes, with the Swedish funded programmes in Southern Africa and Central America resulting in early termination. For regional organisations, the volatility of external aid raises questions on strengthening self determined planning, resourcing and negotiation of OH programmes and partnerships. For external partners, there are questions about organising funding for longer term capacity development, and ensuring accountability and effectiveness while also addressing the need for predictability.