Monday, 22 April 2019
On Monday, the Higher Population Council, through ShareNet Project- Jordan "Knowledge Platform for Reproductive Health Research" held the deliberative dialogue in collaboration with the Erasmus University of Rotterdam- Netherlands. The deliberative dialogue is part of the research project funded by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO / WOTRO) namely “Utilization of scientific evidence and proofs for contribution to improve reproductive health in three countries (Cameroon, Nigeria and Jordan)”, with the participation of relevant national stockholders.

The project, chaired by the University of Erasmus Rotterdam, Netherlands, in collaboration with Cameroon, Nigeria, Netherlands-based ShareNet Foundation, and ShareNet Jordan, aims at setting evidence and policies and translate them into applicable procedures and policies by means of scientific strategies, studies and research review on reproductive health to the benefit of this field.

The Assistant Secretary General of HPC and Director of Strategic Planning Unit, Rania Al-Abaddi, highlighted the importance of the meeting for the enhancement of reproductive health studies and disseminate thereof to expand the knowledge generated by these studies with the national stakeholders in developing policies and practices. The mentioned objective can be achieved by presenting the challenges and lessons learned to define policies and interventions based on scientific pillars. She further noted that the most important outputs of the workshop are how to apply knowledge transfer in order to build operational plans on reproductive health, by presenting a real example for the abstract of policies for youth-friendly health services in the reproductive health field.

She further pointed out that this project comes within the frame of the joint work between HPC, Dutch SheerNet project and the Dutch Organization for Scientific Research in the field of utilizing the scientific evidence based on the outcomes of the studies to achieve better reproductive health. Al-Abaddi highlighted the fact that the HPC is hosting ShareNet Project "Knowledge Platform for Reproductive Health Research"; and the fact that HPC is the national focal point with ShareNet International to carry out its activities in Jordan through its local partners.

The Director of Studies and Policies Unit at HPC, Ali Al-Mutlaq, said that the scientific, quantitative and qualitative strategies, studies and researches published in the three countries will be reviewed to achieve the objectives of the project. Furthermore, meetings shall be held with researchers, health stakeholders, policy makers, CBOs and other institutions working in the field of development; to set the priority road map for the scientific evidence on reproductive health. In the coming years, work will go further on the mentioned evidence, focusing on a common issue in this field between the three countries, and developing work methodologies to be adopted according to the system of follow-up and evaluation.

Al-Mutlaq added that dialogue sessions and brainstorming will also be held for work groups of policy and decision-makers to identify problems related to the common issue, find solutions scenarios, translate them into practical strategies for implementation, assess how to implement the interventions and convert evidence into practical actions; in addition to sharing policies and scientific articles published in scientific journals, preparation of training manuals and building local capacities.

It is worth mentioning that HPC is hosting the Knowledge Platform for Reproductive Health, funded by the Netherlands-based ShareNet, which aims at creating an interactive online platform to support reproductive health research with stakeholders from different sectors, facilitate knowledge building and dissemination thereof in this area. Moreover, capacity building shall be carried out for key partners to identify knowledge gaps; whereas, the Dutch institutions provide a number of grants to Jordan to carry out research and studies on different topics through accredited research centers.

ShareNet is a foundation established by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs as a knowledge base that brings together the experiences of Dutch institutions, partners from the South and international institutions working in the field of reproductive health to enhance knowledge contribution in building evidence-based policies and practices, at both, national and international levels. The main objective thereof is collaboration ton the establishment of a platform to support reproductive health research