Asma Bokhari

A medical doctor with Master's in Public Health; with more than twenty-seven years' experience in areas of health systems strengthening with multi-sectoral integrated development, preventive/public and reproductive health and working in cross-sectional partnerships with community. The experience includes specialized skills in integrating health interventions with community development, project planning monitoring and evaluation, communication and development, gender and development, interpersonal and participatory development communication, video/audio training techniques, and use and promotion of Information Technology (Internet) for sustainable human development. My experience is gained working in both health sector in Pakistan and internationally includes fifteen years of working in public sector, focusing on public health policy, strategic planning, health systems, management and implementation of programs with major emphasis on system strengthening in areas of reproductive health, HIV/AIDS, immunization, MNCH and STI management. During my tenure with the Federal Ministry of Health, I have had extensive experience of policy dialogue, health systems strengthening, programme management, accounting/audit, preparation of health accounts and budgets, designing and implementation of monitoring and evaluation frameworks at federal and provincial levels. Have a thorough understanding of government, development partners and the non-state sector systems. I provided critical leadership in policy and program development for enhancing Pakistan's response to HIV/AIDS, strategic restructuring of the national program from information scarce to information rich program. This included ensuring first time ever provision of essential services to vulnerable populations promoting behavior change using public private partnership model in the health sector. As part of the national MNCH task force, contributed in development of MNCH strategy, and its translation into Action Plan and PC-1 for implementation as technical member. In addition, over the past few years have been involved in development and execution of RMNCH related research activities both qualitative and quantitative, development of an integrated RMNCH and nutrition program, from concept to PC-1, for KP province. Developed the cMYP for the immunization for the KP province following detailed assessment to development of the plan and its costing and Programme Capacity Assessment of Immunization Programmes in various countries. In capacity of among the firstever Principal Recipient for the Global Fund Grant for HIV/AIDS, TB and Malaria in Pakistan, successfully managed the grant and secured Phase Two for HIV and TB grants for Round 2 and 3. The above experience has also provided insights into the broader perspective of health and development with immense opportunities to design, manage, monitor and evaluate health programs. Since concluding my long association with the public sector, I have been working as a freelance consultant based in Islamabad, Pakistan in areas of health and have gained diverse experience while working internationally and nationally in areas of health systems, programme assessments and evaluations, policy and strategy development, programme design, research, system development and as a GMS certified GF consultant and team leader. I have been trained on GF New Funding Model (NFM), EPA and processes. The other GF experiences include grant consolidation, Phase 2 application and programme review of continuation applications including CCM processes, installation and operationalization of Dashboards, EPA and other GF proceses.