• News
    • Latest news
    • News search
    • Health
    • Finance
    • Food
    • Career news
    • Content series
    • Try Devex Pro
  • Jobs
    • Job search
    • Post a job
    • Employer search
    • CV Writing
    • Upcoming career events
    • Try Career Account
  • Funding
    • Funding search
    • Funding news
  • Talent
    • Candidate search
    • Devex Talent Solutions
  • Events
    • Upcoming and past events
    • Partner on an event
  • Post a job
  • About
      • About us
      • Membership
      • Newsletters
      • Advertising partnerships
      • Devex Talent Solutions
      • Contact us
Join DevexSign in
Join DevexSign in

News

  • Latest news
  • News search
  • Health
  • Finance
  • Food
  • Career news
  • Content series
  • Try Devex Pro

Jobs

  • Job search
  • Post a job
  • Employer search
  • CV Writing
  • Upcoming career events
  • Try Career Account

Funding

  • Funding search
  • Funding news

Talent

  • Candidate search
  • Devex Talent Solutions

Events

  • Upcoming and past events
  • Partner on an event
Post a job

About

  • About us
  • Membership
  • Newsletters
  • Advertising partnerships
  • Devex Talent Solutions
  • Contact us
  • My Devex
  • Update my profile % complete
  • Account & privacy settings
  • My saved jobs
  • Manage newsletters
  • Support
  • Sign out
Latest newsNews searchHealthFinanceFoodCareer newsContent seriesTry Devex Pro
    • News
    • News: Global Fund

    Hope for Global Fund's civil society engagement?

    A former employee with deep roots in civil society is coming back to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. It remains to be seen whether her presence will reinvigorate relations between the funding institution and advocates which have a bit cooled lately.

    By Jenny Lei Ravelo // 18 October 2013
    Kate Thomson, head of the new critical enablers and civil society hub at the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Thomson will be leaving her position as chief of community mobilizations at UNAIDS. Photo by: Globa Fund

    A former employee with deep roots in civil society is coming back to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Will this reinvigorate relations between the funding institution and advocates which have a bit cooled lately? 

    Concerns over the Global Fund’s civil society engagement have emerged in the past year as reform efforts designed to make it more efficient and bring back donor confidence led to the demise of its civil society team and the downsizing of its country coordinating mechanisms.

    Now, Kate Thomson, an HIV-positive individual who used to work for the fund back in its early days as manager of civil society relations, is about to lead a group of specialists whose role is to ensure Global Fund grants “support and expand gender equality, human rights, and [the] caling up of community-led services and policy dialogue,” said the fund’s Ibon Villalebeitia. The group is called the Critical Enablers and Civil Society hub.

    To take on the role, Thomson will be temporarily leaving her position as chief of community mobilizations at UNAIDS.

    Thomson has been vocal about her strong belief in involving civil society in every discussion, be it at the United Nations or otherwise.

    “We need to look closely at what’s happening with the Global Fund right now … People living with HIV played an integral part in the creation of the fund and we need to ensure it keeps working with and for us,” she said in a speech before HIV and AIDS advocates last year in Washington, D.C. “And I mean for all of us, no matter which community we are from, or which region we live in … We must keep asking who gets funded and who receives services, and who is excluded. And why. And what we can do to change the status quo.”

    According to Villabeleitia, civil society engagement is part of the fund’s founding principles. In fact, the new funding model has allowed the organization to increase the participation of civil society throughout the grants process, she said.

    The fund acknowledges the importance of civil society in helping “identify programmatic gaps and intervention needs, particularly among women and girls, sex workers, people who use drugs, men who have sex with men, transgender people, people in prison, migrants, indigenous peoples and others who are particularly impacted by one or more of these three diseases.”

    This was seen in practice recently, when the fund engaged civil society in country dialogues and concept note development processes in El Salvador and Myanmar, two of the early applicants under the organization’s new funding model, noted Jason Wright, the U.S. director of the International HIV/AIDS Alliance.

    Still, that doesn’t take away the concerns about the disbandment of the fund’s civil society team and the downsizing of country coordinating mechanisms.

    “It will be extremely difficult to effectively roll out the NFM [new funding mechanims] from the few early applicant countries to all recipient countries with so few staff with expertise and focus on civil society and CCMs [country coordinating mechanims],” he wrote in a commentary for Aidspan, an independent observer of the Global Fund. “The Alliance and other NGOs have committed themselves to supporting civil society engagement at the global and especially national levels, but we need the interlocutors to do so.”

    Read more development aid news online, and subscribe to The Development Newswire to receive top international development headlines from the world’s leading donors, news sources and opinion leaders — emailed to you FREE every business day.

    • Social/Inclusive Development
    • Funding
    Printing articles to share with others is a breach of our terms and conditions and copyright policy. Please use the sharing options on the left side of the article. Devex Pro members may share up to 10 articles per month using the Pro share tool ( ).

    About the author

    • Jenny Lei Ravelo

      Jenny Lei Ravelo@JennyLeiRavelo

      Jenny Lei Ravelo is a Devex Senior Reporter based in Manila. She covers global health, with a particular focus on the World Health Organization, and other development and humanitarian aid trends in Asia Pacific. Prior to Devex, she wrote for ABS-CBN, one of the largest broadcasting networks in the Philippines, and was a copy editor for various international scientific journals. She received her journalism degree from the University of Santo Tomas.

    Search for articles

    Related Stories

    Global HealthOpinion: Civil society has a crucial role in shaping global public health

    Opinion: Civil society has a crucial role in shaping global public health

    Funding insightsWhich global south organizations got Open Society Foundations funding?

    Which global south organizations got Open Society Foundations funding?

    Global health Atul Gawande: Stop-work could destroy US global health infrastructure

    Atul Gawande: Stop-work could destroy US global health infrastructure

    Global HealthAt Vatican meeting, HIV advocates vow to fight past USAID setbacks

    At Vatican meeting, HIV advocates vow to fight past USAID setbacks

    Most Read

    • 1
      How low-emissions livestock are transforming dairy farming in Africa
    • 2
      Opinion: Mobile credit, savings, and insurance can drive financial health
    • 3
      Opinion: India’s bold leadership in turning the tide for TB
    • 4
      How AI-powered citizen science can be a catalyst for the SDGs
    • 5
      Strengthening health systems by measuring what really matters
    • News
    • Jobs
    • Funding
    • Talent
    • Events

    Devex is the media platform for the global development community.

    A social enterprise, we connect and inform over 1.3 million development, health, humanitarian, and sustainability professionals through news, business intelligence, and funding & career opportunities so you can do more good for more people. We invite you to join us.

    • About us
    • Membership
    • Newsletters
    • Advertising partnerships
    • Devex Talent Solutions
    • Post a job
    • Careers at Devex
    • Contact us
    © Copyright 2000 - 2025 Devex|User Agreement|Privacy Statement