Johannesburg, April 29, 2022 - AUDA-NEPAD hosted the African Leadership Meeting (ALM) Regional Health Financing Hubs (RHFH) Technical Meeting in collaboration with the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Secretariat in Johannesburg, on 28 – 29 April 2022.

The purpose of the meeting was for AUDA-NEPAD to support the Member States in driving and harnessing health financing mechanisms, to strengthen health systems within the Southern African region and for the Member States to contribute to the full operationalisation of the SADC Health Financing Hub. In addition, the meeting provided Member States with a progress update on the overarching ALM activities, offering them a platform for sharing the current health financing landscape at the national level and indicating their support requirements from the RHFH. The next steps in the full operationalisation of the Hub within the SADC region were also outlined.

Representatives from Health Departments in the SADC Member States from Eswatini, Lesotho, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, and Zambia took part in this meeting, in addition to the SADC Secretariat, AUDA-NEPAD and AUC representatives.

Some of the key points raised during the meeting were around the strong need for collaboration between the Ministries of Health and the Ministries of Finance in the Member States to ensure adequate and efficient financing in the health systems.  Member States also provided great insight into their health financing structures which allowed for invaluable knowledge sharing of existing finance mechanisms. It was underlined that capacitating focal points within Ministries of Health and Finance in Member States, is vital in securing the continuity of the ALM and the SADC Regional Health Financing Hub.

The Member States presentations demonstrated that the Regional Health Financing Hubs would play a key role in driving resource mobilisation efforts, strengthening resource allocation efficiency, policy development, and knowledge sharing.

In order to foster cross-learning between the two pilot regions (SADC and EAC), the East African Community provided perspective in their efforts to improve health financing within the region. In this regard, EAC expressed the desire to continue leveraging the ALM process with the support of AUDA-NEPAD in their efforts to harness sustainable domestic investments in health.

To date, AUDA-NEPAD continues to work closely with the RECs and Member States to provide strategic and technical support with the aim of improving domestic health financing. While significant headway in supporting the RECs and Member States has been made to strengthen health financing mechanisms, the AUC and AUDA-NEPAD endeavours to enable the full operationalisation of the RHFH and concretise the recommendations from this meeting.

Media Contact:

Ms. Nqobile Zwane | Public Relations Officer | AUDA-NEPAD Development Fund (AUDF) | +27736021448 | nqobilez@nepad.org