Building bridges between stakeholders to solve supply chain challenges and avert stockouts.

The USAID | DELIVER PROJECT worked with national and international partners to expand the availability of contraceptives and essential health products around the world. Occupying a global leadership role in supply chain strengthening and commodity security (CS), the project served as the go-to resource for global and regional partners and a catalyst for global discussions on commodity security. These efforts helped ensure that CS and supply chains are part of the global agenda for improving health outcomes.

Convening national stakeholders to gain consensus, the project supported strategic activities, including development of reproductive health commodity security strategies and operational plans. These activities targeted overall planning, collaboration, and endorsement of supply chain management as a key factor in successful health programs.

The project created online systems that allow donors and countries to share data for planning and rapid responses. Over the past decade, the Procurement Planning and Monitoring Reports for contraceptives and malaria commodities have become key data sources for country-and global-level coordination and information sharing. Stakeholders use these tools to monitor stock levels and make procurement-related decisions.

The project taught countries how to forecast and quantify demand, so they could determine what medicines and supplies they needed, how much, when, and where. Using this and other information, the project helped countries mobilize funding from both in-country and international donor sources. To encourage investment in supply chains and health commodities, the project developed evidence-based advocacy tools that are now used by other organizations.

To improve access to health supplies, the project pioneered work using a total market approach by working with suppliers and financers from all three sectors—public, nonprofit, and commercial—leveraging their various competencies. To improve the environment for commodity security, the project developed multiple strategies and guidance tools on topics such as financial tracking of contraceptives, quantifying the costs of operating supply chains, and contraceptive security indicators. The project made supply chain management of health commodities a global priority and created a global movement.