Strengthening the capacity for health promotion in South Africa through international collaboration.
BACKGROUND
This paper describes a project to strengthen the capacity for health promotion in two Provinces in South Africa. The project draws on the key health promotion capacity dimensions of partnership and networking, infrastructure, problem-solving capacity, and knowledge transfer. The project was carried out in a partnership between the Provinces, the Ministry of Health of South Africa, the government of Flanders, Belgium, and the World Health Organization (WHO).


OBJECTIVE
The project aimed to: (i) integrate health promotion into national, Provincial and district level health policy plans (ii) strengthen the health promotion capacity in the two Provinces; and (iii) support the development of tools to monitor and evaluate health promotion interventions.


METHODS
Starting from a situation analysis and identification of priority health issues and existing actions in each Province, capacity-building workshops were organized for senior participants from various sectors. Community-based health promotion interventions were then planned and implemented in both Provinces.


RESULTS
A systematic evaluation of the project involving an internal audit of project activities and results based on document analysis, site visits, focus groups and interviews with key persons demonstrated that stakeholders in both Provinces saw an increase of capacity in terms of networking, knowledge transfer, problem solving, and to a lesser extent infrastructure. Health promotion had been well integrated in the Provincial health plans, and roll-out processes with local stakeholders had started after the conclusion of the project. The development of tools for monitoring and evaluation of health promotion was less well achieved.


CONCLUSIONS
The project illustrates how capacities to deliver health promotion interventions in a developing country can be enhanced through international collaboration. The conceptual model of capacity building that served as a basis for the project provided a useful framework to plan, identify and assess the key components of health promotion capacity in an African context.
Van den Broucke
Stephan
S
Department of International Health, Faculty of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences, Maastricht University, PO Box 616, NL 6200 MD Maastricht, The Netherlands. s.vandenbroucke@inthealth.unimaas.nl
Jooste
Heila
H
Tlali
Maki
M
Moodley
Vimla
V
Van Zyl
Greer
G
Nyamwaya
David
D
Tang
Kwok-Cho
KC
D001530:Belgium; D057191:Capacity Building; D006076:Government; D006291:Health Policy; D006293:Health Promotion / Q000458:organization & administration*; D006801:Humans; D007391:International Cooperation; D008297:Male; D015397:Program Evaluation; D013019:South Africa; D014944:World Health Organization