AIDS Working Group Meeting Minutes
07 May 2008    2:00 — 4:00pm
WHO Large Conference Room

Chair:  Dr Wiwat Rojanapithayakorn
Vice Chair: Dr Luo Mei

Main topic:    Presentation on the process of the Round 8 proposal Dr Wang Xiaochun
                   Discussion and recommendations from the AIDS Working Group _______________________________________________________________________________

I.    Presentation on the proposal development process, by Dr Wiwat:

1. In the last CCM Meeting (5 March 2008), it was agreed that an AIDS proposal for the Global Fund Round 8 be developed, and the AIDS Working Group was assigned to handle the proposal development process.

2. It was agreed that the Round 8 proposal will be based on the failed Round 7 proposal, taken into consideration the comments from the Global Fund TRP (targeting vulnerable migrants), new topics suggested by the Global Fund, and the suggestions from previous AIDS Working Group Meeting (20 March 2008).

3. A Writing Team was formed based on the recommendation from the AIDS Working Group. Members were from (1) Government sector, (2) NGOs and (3) UN agencies). Dr Wang Xioachun from was selected as the coordinator of the writing team.

4. A core writing team was established to work directly on proposal development.

5. A proposal review team was established.

6. Calls for proposals were made on 3 occasions:  

a)  On 11 March 2008 (after the 23^rd CCM Meeting), by the CCM Secretariat through its website.
b)  On 26 March 2008 through the AIDS Working Group Members and CCM Secretariat website (with 2 additional calls when the sub-proposal templates were provided).
c)  On 7 April through the AIDS Working Group members, for extension of the deadline from 7 April to 15 April 2008.     

II.       Presentation on the progress of proposal development by the Proposal Writing Team. Dr Wang Xiaochun — NCAIDS presented on behalf of the Team

A.  Process

a)   On 10 April, a meeting of the Writing Team was held at WHO and discussed workplan, selection of Review Team and time-frame for proposal writing
b)   6 meetings have been held at WHO, CDC GAP and UNAIDS country offices. A technical meeting was held at NCAIDS

B.        Next steps

a)   The core writing team meetings will continue to Draft the Round 8 proposal using the round 7 proposal as a framework. 
b)   Provincial Meetings
c)   Technical meetings CCW
d)   Goal, Preventing the transmission of HIV and mitigating the impact of HIV on vulnerable migrant populations

C. Proposal Frame:

A document summarizing the brief outline of the Goal, Objectives, Services Delivery Areas and Activities was circulated to AWG members requesting comments and recommendations to improve the proposal (Attachment 1).

III.     Agenda Points Discussion and Recommendations from the AIDS Working Group

A.  Discussion on target population

a)  It was agreed that the round 8 proposal will use the term ‘Vulnerable Migrants’ in the title of the proposal. The term migrant workers and migrant populations will be applied to the text. For this proposal migrants should be vulnerable populations, looking at a broad perspective of migrants regardless of their occupation.  The meaning of vulnerable is based on the poverty indicators i.e. single without family, poverty, poor access to health services, high STI/HIV, risk behavior, and poor access to prevention treatment and care. 

B.  Project Sites

a)  It was recommended to keep locations and sites the same as round 7: Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Guandong, Zhijiang, Jiangsu, Fujian, pending agreement by the provinces;
b)  It would be possible to scale up to other provinces in sub-sequent scaling-up processed (RCC proposals).

C.        Discussion of SDA/Activities

a)         Emphasis should be placed on policy implementation (not on policy development), with focus on creating ‘enabling’ environment. In other words, the Round 8 Proposal should not focus on developing new policies. Instead, it should focus on implementation of existing national policies;
b)        Make response the Round 7 TRP comments;
c)         More support for NGOs is needed, particularly at community level. 
d)        Community strengthening should ensure that enough funds go to the non-government sector for implementation.  The writing team will note that this will be addressed in the budget section. 
e)         The policy development part should be supported by the government not the global fund. 
f)         Activities on Health System Strengthening are not clearly specified.
g)        Writing team needs to discuss with the government regarding matching funds and what the government can provide.
h)        GF has provided a list of areas on health system strengthening. The writing team should review this and add some relevant activities in the Proposal;
i)          Meeting participants were requested to review the outline document and provide feedback to the Writing Team, either verbally or in writing, through Dr Wang Xiaochun (the coordinator of the writing team) — 13701265920 or wxcaids@hotmail.com

IV.     Other Business

A.        PR selection,

a)         For Round 7 proposal, the AWG suggested that SCAWCO be PR;
b)        AWG should begin a call for PR. AWG will make decision in the next meeting (by the end of May or the first week of June.

B.        SR selection,

a)         There was a suggestion that a call for SR can be made when the activities are cleary defined. If SRs are not selected before the submission of the proposal, description on selection criteria should be included in the proposal.
b)        The Writing Team was advised to follow the relevant section(s) in the Round 7 proposal. 

V.       Next steps,

A.       The writing team will consolidate a draft and submit to the working group members and the review team. 

B.        The AWG will meet again by the first week of June to discuss the draft proposal as well as the selection of PR(s). This will happen before the next CCM meeting in mid-June.

C.        Propose to CCM that the proposal application be made in Euros to avoid depreciation of USD. This matter will be proposed to the CCM.

D.       The AWG needs to review sub-proposals and decide the criteria for evaluation of the proposals.

E.        Members were requested to review the draft outline and send responses to the writing team by the end of the week so that the writing team would incorporate comments into the proposal.

F.        Initiate the involvement of NGOs.  Expanded writing team should start to call for suggestions. The writing team will incorporate the involvement of the NGOs in the Draft proposal.

Minutes taken by Andrea Boudville