Mapping of Reproductive Health Financing: Methodological Challenges

Comprehensive data on financial resources in reproductive health sector is critical for planners and policy makers, particularly in developing countries. Low level of funding for reproductive health is a cause of concern, given that RH service utilization in the vast majority of the developing world is well below the desired levels. Though there is an urgent need to track the domestic and international financial resource flows for reproductive health, the instruments through which financial resources are tracked in developing countries are limited. In this paper we examined the methodological and conceptual challenges of monitoring financial resources for family planning and reproductive health services at the international and national level. Results suggest that the Creditor Reporting System (CRS), which is the best possible data source to track donors contribution fails to give the complete picture of the Official Development Assistance (ODA) for reproductive health. At the national level Reproductive Health sub-accounts (RHA) suffers from country specific challenges related to definitional and boundary issues of RH activities. Lastly, weak link between data production by the RHA and its application by the stakeholders and lack of political will act as decelerate factor for the institutionalization of RHA at the country leve