Press Release
23 August 2006
DFID Commits £252 million to save the lives of a million children and
mothers in India
 Hilary Benn, UK Secretary of State for International Development, today
announced £252 million ($470 million) of planned funding for an initiative
designed to save one million lives every year in India. The funds will be spent
over five years in support of the second phase of the Government of India’s
nationwide Reproductive and Child Health Programme.
Hilary Benn said:
"The birth of a child ought to be a joyful experience, but for more than
100,000 women in India giving birth means death for them and possibly their
baby as well. Every year more than two million Indian children will die
before they reach their fifth birthday.
"The tragedy is that these deaths could so easily be prevented if mothers
going into labour had the support of a skilled midwife, and children were
properly immunised against killers such as measles and tetanus. The UK is
keen to support the Government of India’s single biggest response to prevent
needless deaths that destroy families across the country".
The programme will introduce new measures to tackle concerns about
procurement irregularities in the first phase of the Reproductive and Child
Health Programme, that was not funded by DFID. An action plan will help
strengthen competitive tendering procedures and increase transparency for the
purchasing of drugs and equipment, and new standards will be introduced to
improve the quality of products. Until these measures take effect, all
procurement contracts over $200,000 will be handled by international agents.
Across the world, 530,000 mothers die each year while giving birth. One in
five of those deaths are in India. More than 10 million children die before the
age of five every year, and one in four of all these deaths occur in India, with
1.2 million infants dying within a month of their birth. The UN’s Millennium
Development Goals, which include measures to reduce extreme poverty and improve
the health of the world’s poorest people by 2015, will not be met unless these
appalling statistics can be reversed.
The overall aim of the Reproductive and Child Health programme is to reduce
significantly India’s maternal mortality rate from 407 per 100,000 live births
in 1998 to 100 per 100,000 in 2015, and to cut the mortality rate of under-5’s
from 70 to 30 per 1000 live births over the same period.
DFID has worked with the Government of India in the design of the
comprehensive Reproductive and Child Health programme, which aims to provide
good quality reproductive healthcare services for the poor and disadvantaged
regardless of their income. The total cost of the programme is around $10
billion, and DFID’s planned $470 million is the largest donor contribution.
Other donors include the World Bank, the European Commission, USAID and a number
of UN agencies including UNICEF. The first tranche of DFID funding (£10 million
or around $18 million) will be made this year, and further payments will be
subject to satisfactory progress on procurement arrangements.
The programme will provide care throughout pregnancy, childbirth and
childhood, including skilled birth attendance, obstetric emergency care,
community based care for newborn children, immunisation, adolescent health and
the treatment of sexually transmitted infections. Poor and marginalised women,
who are often denied the most basic healthcare, will be some of the biggest
beneficiaries of the programme in some of India’s poorest states, including
Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Orissa and Madhya Pradesh.
DFID’s funding will be used for upgrading maternity facilities, increasing
the number of skilled midwives at births, purchasing essential drugs, equipment,
staff training, health awareness drives, developing strategies to improve
adolescent health and promoting partnerships with the private sector and NGOs
for reaching the poor.
Notes to Editors
1. The first phase of Reproductive and Child Health (RCH1) was launched in
1997 after the International Conference on Population and Development held at
Cairo in 1994. Building on the lessons learnt from RCH1, the second phase (RCH2)
will involve innovations such as decentralised planning with a special focus on
the poor and marginalised, technical interventions, partnerships with the public
sector, and behaviour change.
2. Of the UK’s £252m, £245m will be Financial Aid and £7m
Technical
Co-operation over five years (2006/07–2010/11). DFID will begin to disburse the
first tranche of £10m later this year.
3. New measures under the current phase, that will address concerns about
procurement irregularities from an earlier part of the programme, include DFID
support for the implementation of an action plan to improve how all goods and
services are bought by
 India’s Ministry of Health. Strengthened procurement
procedures will ensure more competition in tendering contracts, and will reduce
risks of collusion among suppliers. Transparency will be much improved through
the posting of procurement processes on the Health Ministry’s website, and
through better procedures for handling complaints. High quality guarantees of
products purchased will be achieved through the introduction of new standards.
Until these measures take effect, all purchasing contracts over $200,000 under
the programme will be undertaken through an internationally selected procurement
agent, or through UN agencies. These agreements will greatly enhance guarantees
against the risks of any irregular practices in procurement.
4. For further information please contact the DFID press office in London on
020 7023 0620.
Links
 Back to top
| 
Directgov |
(273
kb)