A mobilized community

INTERNATIONAL COUNCIL OF AIDS SERVICE ORGANIZATIONS

ANNUAL REPORT

2006

Table of contents
Founded in 1991, the International Council of AIDS Service Organizations (ICASO) mission is to mobilize and support diverse community organizations to build an effective global response to HIV and AIDS. Our vision is of a world where people living with and affected by HIV and AIDS can enjoy life free from stigma, discrimination, and persecution, and have access to prevention, treatment and care. The ICASO network of networks operates globally, regionally and locally, and reaches over 100 countries internationally. ICASO operates from its International Secretariat in Canada and through Regional Secretariats based in five continents. An expanded response (Executive Directors message) Global support to community sector advocacy Building community capacity to advocate Advocating for universal access Mobilizing and strengthening partnerships and networks Consulting and communicating Financial report 1 2 4 6 8 10 11

Latin American and the Caribbean Council of AIDS Service Organizations

LACCASO

North American Council of AIDS Service Organizations

NACASO

Copyright 2007 by the International Council of AIDS Service Organizations (ICASO)

As the response to HIV and AIDS has evolved, so too has ICASO. An expanded, stronger network of networks has helped mobilize community sector organizations to shape and lead the global AIDS agenda. The recent scaling-up of AIDS responses and associated funding, while critical, is still insufficient to meet the needs of millions of people seeking universal access to prevention, treatment, care and support services. We know that the many successes, both at a national and community level, provide the evidence for what works. Despite this, many policies and programmes continue to undermine efforts towards universal access. History has shown us that a mobilized community sector is key to challenging such barriers. With more organizations responding to HIV and AIDS, ICASOs challenge in 2006 was how to support the mobilization of such diversity within our existing capacities. We responded by expanding our programmatic, geographic, and financial base, in close cooperation with our Regional Secretariats, marginalized groups, and broader stakeholders. Following extensive consultations, a longer-term strategy was also developed, resulting in a new set of strategic directions to shape our work for 2007-2011. These are to: 1. Build community sector capacity to advocate. 2. Advocate for the effective implementation of universal access to comprehensive HIV and AIDS services. 3. Mobilize and strengthen community sector partnerships and networks. 4. Develop a stronger, more effective organization and network.

These are framed within a clearer vision, mission, and our longstanding guiding principles. For ICASO, Greater Involvement of People Living with and Affected by HIV/AIDS (GIPA), gender equality, and human rights are not just statements of principles. They are the basic tenets for our thinking and action. Such action in 2006 has included strengthening capacity at the national, regional, and global levels for direct advocacy by the communities most marginalized and affected by HIV and AIDS. This has included providing resources and support for consultation and direct action to organizations and networks of people living with HIV, women, sex workers, and men who have sex with men, to name a few. In particular, through our major Prevention and Treatment Advocacy Project (PTAP), much of this support is aimed at national level community advocates. During 2006, ICASO was involved in all the major global initiatives on AIDS, such as Universal Access, the Three Ones, UNAIDS and Global Fund Boards, the International AIDS Conference, the Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS, and Uniting for Prevention, amongst others. This involvement was centered on supporting broader community sector involvement, voices, and coordination, in partnership with many other organizations. ICASOs increasing ability to support effective advocacy and involvement of communities is based on years of experience. We have learned that our support needs to continue to be centered on facilitating the most marginalized and affected communities to be the drivers of the AIDS agenda.

Richard Burzynski Executive Director

An expanded response
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ICASOs 2006 programs at a glance

Prevention & Treatment Advocacy Project Global Fund UNGASS Declaration of Commitment Universal Access Uniting for Prevention Supported national organizations in ten countries to network, build skills, and advocate for alignment and expansion of prevention and treatment. Mobilized and convened advocacy on resource mobilization and commitments to a new funding round. Supported community sector analysis and shadow reports that were reflected in the UN Secretary-Generals report to the General Assembly. Facilitated joint community sector positions and actions in global policy committees and the UN High Level Meeting. Actively involved in mobilizing a prevention constituency and helped develop guidance on evidence informed prevention responses. Supported the development of country action plans to effectively involve communities in national AIDS coordination. Supported NGO delegates to ensure inclusion of NGOs in the Global Joint Problem Solving Team, and a review of NGO involvement in the PCB. Participated in revising WHOs new guidance on Provider Initiated Testing and Counseling to better reflect human rights concerns. Partnered with womens organizations to incorporate SRHR and gender issues into the UN Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS. Supported skills-building and awareness-raising amongst NGOs on implementing the Code. Published analysis of community involvement in vaccine research, and involved in action planning on microbicides. Co-organized conference and provided platform for marginalized communities and networks.

The continued expansion of ICASOs programs in 2006 was a response to the increasing numbers and diversity of community sector organizations addressing HIV and AIDS. ICASO needed to increase its support to these organizations and advocates so they could more effectively mobilize, network, and coordinate their advocacy. This support was based around the need to ensure that community representatives, advocates, and activists, particularly the most vulnerable and marginalized, had a direct and leading role in setting HIV and AIDS agendas. The programmatic support was provided in partnership with ICASOs Regional Secretariats on five continents and many other organizations at the regional, national and global levels. Our own direct advocacy was based on our programs that gather evidence from communities at the grassroots. This advocacy was also based on our own commitments to the principle of Greater Involvement of People Living with and Affected by HIV/AIDS (GIPA) and to challenging policies, programming and practices that undermine best practice in public health and/or that violate human rights.

Three Ones UNAIDS Programme Coordinating Board Human Rights Gender

NGO Code of Practice Vaccines and Microbicides International AIDS Conference

photo: Sudanese refugees who lack access to HIV prevention and treatment services, Kenya

Building community capacity to advocate

Increasingly the response to HIV and AIDS demands a greater and more central role of communities in national agenda-setting, coordination, and decision-making. It also requires that the community sector be able to more actively hold their governments to account for their commitments at the national and global levels. As a result, in 2006 ICASO increased its support and channeled more resources to build the capacity of the community sector to do this direct advocacy. Central to this work is the ICASO multi-year ten-country Prevention and Treatment Advocacy Project (PTAP). 2006 saw a scaling-up of support for this locally-owned national community sector networking and advocacy. Working with the ICASO Regional Secretariats, national focal point organizations have built strong partnerships and coalitions of civil society organizations for advocacy around aligning and expanding prevention and treatment programs and services. In Kenya, KANCO facilitated consultations with the community sector to input into discussions on the governments proposed AIDS Prevention and Control Bill. Communities called for the inclusion of a stronger statement on scaling-up HIV prevention and treatment, eliminating prejudice and discrimination in health settings, and protecting confidentiality of HIV status. In Russia, where only the government can legally implement harm reduction programs for injecting drug users, NGOs are advocating to have the right to also deliver these programs. These two country experiences are examples of the many community advocacy achievements that ICASOs support is helping to fulfill. The model of working with partners at the regional and national levels is proving to provide a sustainable platform for mobilizing community sector involvement in national responses.

In support of this work, ICASO continued to partner with AfriCASO, the International HIV/AIDS Alliance, and UNAIDS to develop practical guidelines on community involvement. Through the support of ICASO, workshops in Nigeria, Venezuela, and Ukraine resulted in detailed action plans for more effective involvement of the community sector in national AIDS coordination (within the Three Ones principles). This kind of support from ICASO has also been critical at the global level. In 2006 this involved increasing the capacity of community sector representatives on the UNAIDS-led Universal Access Global Steering Committee. Led by the representatives themselves, ICASO raised resources and provided extensive communication and consultation support. The resulting recommendations in the UN Secretary-Generals report on Universal Access contained many issues raised by the community sector. ICASOs support extended to ensuring that the community sector issues were also heard within the formal review of implementation of the Declaration of Commitment and in the negotiations of the Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS. ICASO recognizes that building community capacity for leadership and representation is vital for credible and effective involvement in global institutions. Therefore, ICASO has maintained its support in 2006 to representatives within the UNAIDS Programme Coordinating Board and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB & Malaria board. This has helped ensure more effective mechanisms for consultation, and has resulted in policies and funding allocations that support community sector involvement in decision-making and as major program implementors.

Prevention and Treatment Advocacy Project:

A multi-country project that is supporting community advocates in influencing national AIDS responses.
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1

Adding Botswana and Rwanda to the existing countries supported by PTAP: Belize, China, India, Jamaica, Kenya, Nigeria, Russia, and Ukraine.

photo: Challenges of access to services in a slum in Dhaka, Bangladesh

Advocating for universal access

ICASO undertakes advocacy informed by evidence from consultations with communities at the grassroots, mobilizing support for issues identified by the most vulnerable and affected communities. This advocacy is always done in partnership with community sector organizations from the national, regional or global levels. As a framework for scaling-up HIV prevention, treatment and care at the country level, Universal Access has become an important goal. ICASOs advocacy in 2006 sought to ensure that there were international commitments to genuinely achieving universal access, and to ensuring accountability for the continued implementation of the UNGASS Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS. Delivering on these commitments, with the active and full participation of the community sector, is increasingly recognized as essential if the world is to meet the Millennium Development Goals. ICASO undertook global consultations in four languages to support community sector input into the development of the UN General Assembly reviews and negotiations. This resulted in the global position paper A Call for Political Leadership: Community sector recommendations for the UN Political Declaration endorsed by over 250 organizations worldwide. In addition, ICASO directly facilitated community sector input into the negotiations of the Political Declaration and related media activities. Many of their issues were incorporated into the final declaration. In relation to this work, ICASO released findings of a two-year project supporting national community sector organizations to monitor and report on the implementation of the Declaration of Commitment. Fourteen country reports were submitted to UNAIDS for incorporation for the very first time into the UN Secretary-Generals report to the General Assembly in June 2006. ICASO also played a leading role in the global efforts to mobilize a prevention constituency. We advocated not only for interventions that we have today, but also for better tools, notably vaccines and microbicides, for the future. This involved joint work with International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) to produce analysis of community involvement in vaccine

UNAIDS received separate reports from civil society for over 30 countries, [14 of which ICASO submitted], which allows an assessment of political commitment, quality and equity of service coverage, and how well stigma and discrimination are being addressed.
- UNAIDS 2006 Global AIDS Epidemic Report

research, and being active participants in the initiative Standing Up for HIV Prevention led by UNAIDS and the Swedish government. In addition, ICASO was part of a small expert drafting team to develop the UNAIDS Guidelines for Intensifying Prevention in support of the implementation of UNAIDS Prevention Position Paper. Such involvement within UNAIDS initiatives and advisory groups forms a key part of ICASOs efforts to ensure the inclusion of community issues in global AIDS agendas and responses. ICASO continued to serve on the Global Reference Group on HIV/AIDS and Human Rights. This included providing extensive input into efforts to revise WHOs new guidance on Provider Initiated Testing and Counseling to better address human rights concerns. Outside the UN, the Global Fund plays a critical role in financing efforts to achieve universal access. ICASO spearheaded an advocacy campaign on Global Fund resource mobilization to ensure that the Round 6 Call for Proposals was fully funded. ICASO then undertook advocacy to make sure that global support systems are developed to support more effective implementation of grants.
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photo: Port workers participating in peer-education condom promotion, Tanzania

Mobilizing and strengthening partnerships and networks

The complexity, diversity, and sheer numbers of community sector organizations involved in HIV and AIDS creates its own coordination challenges. Ensuring good practice and the meaningful involvement of the most marginalized in these efforts becomes even more critical. ICASO has responded by building systems and structures to connect global community sector advocates. This involves channelling up-to-date community sector issues from the national to regional and international levels and back again. It also means convening and facilitating diverse organizations to ensure better informed and effective community sector advocacy. Earlier examples in this report of ICASOs capacity building and advocacy activities in 2006 are intricately linked to this networking and partnership building. The facilitation of joint community sector recommendations for the UN Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS involved the mobilization of hundreds organizations around the world. This ranged from AIDS service organizations, to PLHIV networks, human rights groups, and sex worker networks and womens organizations, to name a few. Connecting diverse communities in this way requires organization. For example, it is widely acknowledged that ICASO has played an important role in building an effective civil society Communication Focal Point model for the Global Fund Board. In 2006, ICASO strengthened this by ensuring broader input to the Global Funds policy and strategies by consulting with and convening different constituency groups within the Board. The International AIDS Conference in Toronto in August 2006 provided a key venue for ICASO to support community networking and partnerships. As a conference co-organizer, ICASO was actively supporting community involvement in all aspects of the design and implementation of the conference. Its own sessions focused on providing a platform for marginalized communities to network. This focused on reviewing the

impact of damaging policies, including the lack of access to harm reduction services, restrictions on sex work, laws related to men who have sex with men, and barriers for PLHIV to access treatment. This support for community sector mobilization was particular effective within PTAP, the ICASO ten-country advocacy project. This involved broadening participation to include hundreds of diverse organizations to support advocacy on the alignment and expansion of prevention and treatment. In Yunnan Province in China and in Nigeria, partnerships were developed with organizations of women living with HIV. In Rwanda, efforts were made to involve hundreds of organizations across the country. In all countries, partnerships were developed with governments and the UN to increase the effectiveness of community sector advocacy. Facilitating partnerships to ensure good practice and policies by governments was clearly an effective component of ICASOs 2006 activities. Another was the work it undertook to ensure NGOs themselves are committed to evidence-informed policies and programming. As a member of the Global Steering Committee of the NGO Code of Good Practice, ICASO supported efforts to mobilize resources, build skills, and raise awareness and commitment to the Code.

[The Code] provides a set of principles of good practice for advocacy and AIDS programming to which nongovernmental organizations can commit themselves and be held accountable.
- UNAIDS 2006 Report on the Global AIDS Epidemic

GLOBAL FUND Alert - Round 6 in April 2006 (6 X 6) (April 2006) Alert - Urgent Need To Mobilize Resources For Round 6 (June 2006) Alert - Fund the Gap (Aug. 2006)

VACCINES Community Involvement in HIV Vaccine Research: Making It Work

ANNUAL REPORT

UNGASS DECLARATION OF COMMITMENT AND THE POLITICAL DECLARATION ON HIV/AIDS Community Monitoring and Evaluation: Implementation of the UNGASS Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS AIDS Advocacy Alert Community Participation in the Monitoring and Evaluation of the implementation of the UNGASS Declaration of Commitment AIDS Advocacy Guide Meaningful Involvement of Civil Society in the UNGASS Review Meeting (with HDNet) Universal Access: Issues of Concern to Civil Society, results from a consultation process A Call for Political Leadership: Community Sector Recommendations for the UN Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS

Consulting and communicating

As community sector mobilization for advocacy on HIV and AIDS expands, so does the need to increase the accessibility and availability of quality information. In 2006, ICASO produced resources in multiple languages to help build the capacity for better informed joint community sector advocacy.

Financial report

In 2006, ICASO increased its financial support to an expanding set of programs, with over CAD $3.7 million of grants and contributions. This is an increase of over 25% on 2005, and over 155% on 2004. Combined with this growth, ICASO committed higher amounts of funding to support national and regional organizations and projects, at two-thirds of the total expenditure, with less than a third going to global projects, and less than 7% on core costs. Our largest source of funding continues to be the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation at over half of the total. We are also maintaining a diversity of other donors, from governments, NGOs, private sector, and the United Nations.

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Statement of Financial Position

Year ended December 31,2006, with comparative figures for 2005 ASSETS Current Assets: Cash Short-term investments Accounts receivable Prepaid expenses and deposits 2006 2005

Statement of Operations
Year ended December 31, 2006, with comparative figures for 2005

$ 97,418 1,724,025 54, 028 11,813 1,887,284 46,996 -$ 1,934,280

$ 168,238 472,425 161,302 32,311 834,276 59,641 150,000 $ 1,043,917

REVENUE Grants and contributions Interest Other

2006 $ 2,777,848 64,738 203,862 3,046,448

2005 $ 2,743,242 31,697 62,763 2,837,702

Capital Assets Long-term investments

EXPENSES LIABILITIES AND NET ASSETS Current Liabilities: Accounts payable and accrued liabilities 223,135 Deferred contributions 1,030,883 1,245,018 Net Assets: Invested in capital assets 46,996 Internally restricted reserve 324,782 Unrestricted 308,484 680,262 $ 1,934,280 Support for Regional Secretariats Salaries and benefits Other support for regional activities Professional fees Travel Occupancy Office and general Amortization of capital assets Foreign exchange (gain) loss 1,384,066 916,969 102,976 153,125 133,388 64,451 85, 256 33,968 (2,294) 2,871,905 $ 174,543 1,360,671 769,843 -247,920 210,192 59,764 59,586 50,665 1,175 2,759,816 $ 77,886

264,036 274,162 538,198 59,641 324,782 121,296 505,719 $ 1,043,917

Excess of revenue over expenses

Donors
ICASOs support to community sector organizations responding to HIV and AIDS would not have been possible without the generous support of our donors and partner organizations, including: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA) Ford Foundation GlaxoSmithKlines Positive Action Programme Government of Canada, through the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) Merck & Co. Inc. Population Action International (PAI)

ICASO - International Secretariat

EXECUTIVE OFFICE

Regional Secretariats AfriCASO - Dr. Cheick Tidiane Tall +221 8593939 - cttall@africaso.net AIDS Action Europe (Eastern Office) - Marija Subataite +370 5 2609007, 2691600 aae-easternoffice@ceehrn.org (Western Office) - Martine van der Meulen +31 (0) 20 6262 669 westernoffice@aidsactioneurope.org APCASO - Goh SoonSiew (603)4045 1033, (603)4043 9602 apcaso_2000@yahoo.com LACCASO - Edgar Carrasco/ Renate Koch +1 (58-212) 232 7938 laccaso-sr@accsi.org.ve/ laccaso-de@accsi.org.ve NACASO - Shaleena Theophilus +1 (613) 230-3580 shaleena@cdnaids.ca

Richard Burzynski Natalia Ciausova & COMMUNICATIONS Kieran Daly Mary Ann Torres (vacant)
POLICY PROGRAMS

Executive Director Executive Assistant

Director of Policy and Communications Senior Program Officer Senior Communications Officer

Joe Mahase Sumita Banerjee Valrie Pierre-Pierre & ADMINISTRATION Lana Wright Myriam Motta Gala Vrabiye
FINANCE

Director of Programs Program Officer Monitoring & Evaluation Officer

Director of Finance & Administration Finance Officer Administrative Coordinator

ICASO International Council of AIDS Service Organizations

International Secretariat 65 Wellesley Street E., Suite 403 Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4Y 1G7 t: +1 416 921 0018 f: +1 416 921 9979 icaso@icaso.org www.icaso.org