Problem Analysis:  South Asia has 24% of the world’s population or 1.45 billion people and this huge populace is increasing by over 26m per year. The sheer numbers of people living essentially in relatively resource poor settings has led to poor access of sexual and reproductive health services. This lack of access is further exacerbated by high levels of gender inequalities, restrictive norms and regions in conflict.

• In Bangladesh and Nepal skilled personnel attend only 11% and 12% of births respectively.
• The unmet need for contraceptive services in the region is highlighted by the reliance of South Asian women on induced abortion as a method of birth control. In Nepal unsafe abortions account for 50% of the maternal deaths.
• The lack of access to preventive health information services has made India home to the 4.5 million PLWHAs, next only to South Africa.
• South Asia has the highest number of displaced persons – 5m who do not fall under any formalized sector of access to services.

Strategic Direction: To address this state of affairs, SARO will work to increase access to SRH services by reducing social and cultural barriers that impede access of men and women to essential services.

Goal:  All poor marginalized and underserved people in South Asia are able to exercise their rights and have access to SRH information, sexuality education and quality services including family planning.

Objective:  All poor marginalized and underserved people in South Asia are able to exercise their rights and have access to SRH information, sexuality education and quality services including family planning.

Activities:

• Undertake indicative gender sensitive research using secondary and primary data on social and cultural factors influencing lack of access to SRH services.
• Undertake an online assessment of attitudes of key service providers in SDPs run by MAs.
• Identify key social issues that prevent men from taking on responsibility regarding their sexual behaviour and build capacities of MAs to develop innovative strategies to address these concerns.
• Strengthen BCC approaches that engage MAs and their clients in revisiting the social/cultural barriers using community based approaches through strengthened outreach services.
• Improve quality of services through self assessment methodologies, e.g., QOC programme.
• Document innovative approaches and share learnings through regional study visits and exchanges.
• Conduct issue polls at various intervals at SDPs and with clients using these services to record any successes or failures.
• Strengthen outreach services to meet the unmet needs of SRH information, education and services of underserved and marginalized communities.

Outcomes and Indicators: