Illicit Drug use in the Asia Pacific Region - Burnet Institute

Situational analysis of illicit drug issues and responses in the Asia–Pacific region
386
B3 .11 The Pacific
NZAID
1 . The UNICEF partnership with NZAID is for
$NZ 2 million over three years (starting this
financial year) and will include funding for
three key UNICEF programs: an Expanded
Programme of Immunisation; Prevention
of Mother-to-Child Transmission of HIV;
and Pacific Youth Health and Development
(elaborated on below) .
Pacific Youth Health and Development focuses
on three main components: peer education
through master trainers at community level,
integration of the curriculum into the primary
and high school curricula, and communication
activities . The program objective is to build up
the life skills of at least 20 per cent of young
people (80,000 of the 400,000 young people
aged between 15 and 24 years old) in the 14
Pacific Island countries covered by UNICEF;
integrate life skills into late primary and high
school curricula and develop creative communication
materials to reinforce skills building for
young people and HIV/AIDS prevention .
2 . STI/HIV and Development Program aims
to increase Pacific Island capacity for a more
effective and sustainable response to the
spread of HIV/STI and the care for those with
AIDS . The program takes a multi-dimensional
approach to HIV/STI, giving recognition to
economic and social development issues
(including governance, employment, poverty,
gender equality and the impact on children
and families) . The project is managed by
UNDP through the Suva office, working with
the UN regional programs based in both Fiji
and Samoa . NZAID has committed $600,000
to the initiative, ending next financial year .
A range of project activities have been undertaken,
including a number of workshops and
training sessions on HIV/AIDS and STIs for
key health workers and government officials,
research surveys on key HIV/AIDS and STI
issues in the Pacific, national legislative
reviews, counselling for people living with
HIV/AIDS and their families, weekly newspaper
columns on HIV/AIDS prevention,
condom distribution through NGOs, and the
development of curriculum materials . Alongside
project activities, the program has also
supported a full-time UNAIDS coordinator
position located in Suva . NZAID’s funding for
this program will end next financial year .
3 . Masculinity, Mental Health and Violence
(MMHV) project aims to: ‘reduce the growing
trend of young Pacific men using violence
to deal with depression and assert their
masculine power’ . The project is managed
by the Foundation of the Peoples of the
South Pacific (FSPI) . The MMHV project is
carried out in Kiribati, Vanuatu, Fiji and
Papua New Guinea, through FSPI affiliate
NGOs . NZAID has committed $1,176,410
to the initiative over three financial years,
ending in 2006–07 .
All four NGOs have completed their situation
analyses (SA) focusing on young
men and mental health, which will inform
the target groups, types of activities and
promotion/advocacy strategy for the
project . The SA includes a literature review,
stakeholder interviews, community action
participatory process consultations (CAPP)
and a knowledge, attitude and practice
(KAP) survey . The CAPP process was adopted
from a Papua New Guinea model titled
‘Promoting Health through Community
Action Participation’ originally developed
by the Papua New Guinea Department of
Health’s Health Promotion Branch and the
Women’s and Children’s Health Project,
funded by AusAID . A further process utilised
by the Vanuatu Red Cross Society was also
integrated into the process when targeting
non-traditional settings . This approach has
been documented and both successes and
lessons learnt will be documented in a model
which the project hopes to share with the
whole Pacific Island region .
Final SA drafts will be completed between
the end of February and end of March with
work plans for activities and commencement
of same to begin immediately after . What is
perhaps the first education and awareness
model for communities, workplaces and
parliamentarians has been developed in
collaboration with expertise from the Fiji
School of Medicine, the University of the
South Pacific and the private sector . It will
be given to the region for comments, finally
pre-tested by the national managers, and
then developed firstly for the four countries,
and then replicated for the region within a
year of piloting .
4 . NZAID has committed $829,477 to a
student teaching initiative, which ends in
2005–06 . The project is managed by Wan
Smolbag and takes place in Vanuatu, the
Solomon Islands and Fiji . The project aims
to increase the use of innovative teaching
methods to stimulate self-expression and
debate of key development issues, in both
formal and non-formal education . Small
groups of Wan Smolbag trainers work with
individual schools, teacher training establishments
and non-formal educators . The trainers
model the use of videos, audiocassettes and
guides in workshops with teachers and NGO
trainers . So far the project has given Wan
Smolbag the capacity to create new materials
on good governance, HIV/AIDS, substance
abuse and the environment . The materials
for use in communities and the classroom
are backed up with DVD and audiocassettes
to bring the subjects alive .
387
Appendix B: Regional aid projects, in full