Annual Report 2006 - The Global Fund

36
Providing Incentives
for Strong Performance
through the Rolling
Continuation Channel
At its Fourteenth Meeting in November 2006, the
Global Fund Board approved the establishment
of a new funding channel called the Rolling
Continuation Channel (RCC).
This new channel enables CCMs which
oversee strongly-performing grants to seek
continuing funding at the end of these grants’
lifetime (most grants last five years) through a
more streamlined and flexible process. This
channel will provide a higher level of predictability
of funding compared to the normal annual rounds
of grant application. To qualify under this new
channel, grants will have to show strong sustained
performance and potential for impact.
Qualifying grants will have the flexibility to
scale up the interventions and expand the scope of
the programs. Funding will be available for up to
six additional years.
Proposals will be reviewed by the TRP prior to
funding decisions by the Board. The Secretariat is
currently designing the details of the RCC
process. Initial approvals of funding under RCC
are scheduled for the second half of 2007.
The RCC is expected to act as a positive
incentive across all grants by rewarding strong
performance with a simple and rapid window for
continued funding beyond year five.
Middle East and North Africa. Once the money is in country, funds
have been rapidly distributed to and used by local entities: as of
December 2006, grants had expended or committed 81 percent of the
funds disbursed to them.
Disbursement decisions are usually straightforward: funding
follows performance. If a grant achieves its process, coverage and
impact targets and makes prudent use of its budget, the next
disbursement follows without complication. In case of delays,
however, a disbursement would usually be reduced by the amount
that has not been used during the period under report. In other
words, the PR first has to use the budget made available at an earlier
disbursement before a new disbursement would be made.
Managing Performance-Based Funding
Managing such a broad, worldwide portfolio involves challenges.
The Secretariat has developed several tools to administer the grantmaking
process, monitor progress and handle the difficulties that
arise when grants are not performing as expected. Since April 2006,
the Global Fund has made further progress in the rollout of the Early
Alert and Response System (EARS), implementing a mechanism for
tracking grant performance for all grants in the Global Fund’s
portfolio and communicating it through the website.
The EARS operational plan was finalized in June 2006 and a
new series of grant support meetings with each of the Secretariat’s
eight cluster teams was launched, during which the newly-introduced