First in-country meeting between ACAP collaborator and INDEPTH member sites in Tanzania

Friday 11 July 2003

UNICEF Conference Hall, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Background Outcome

The African Census Analysis Project (ACAP) of the University of Pennsylvania, U.S.A, and the INDEPTH Network with Secretariat in Ghana have recently reached a collaborative arrangement. ACAP members are Central Statistics Offices (CSOs) / Census Bureaus (CBs) whereas INDEPTH members are demographic surveillance system (DSS) sites. The main objective of the collaboration is to pool the resources and expertise of ACAP and INDEPTH to undertake high quality joint research projects in order to inform demographic and health policy in Africa. In particular, the collaborative activities between the two institutions will involve research and training, which would involve among other things:

- Realisation of joint research projects on patterns, characteristics, and trends in African population and health using census, survey, and demographic surveillance system data. This research will result in common published research.

- Exchanging of experiences and expertise of research fellows working on specific topics that uses both types of data.

- Facilitation of access to defined data banks by project researchers.

- Co-organising workshops, seminars, and conferences to disseminate findings to policy makers and to enhance research capacity of African researchers.

In order to achieve these objectives, there is need for DSS member sites and Central Statistics Offices / Census Bureaus in the same countries to establish collaborations, formalise and strengthen relationships.

We propose to facilitate a small meeting which will bring together the National Bureau of Statistics in Tanzania and all DSS sites in the country.

It is to be held at the UNICEF Conference Hall, Dar es Salaam, on 11 July 2003.

The objectives of the proposed meeting are:

· To get the two parties (ACAP-collaborator and INDEPTH member sites) engage in exploratory discussions and provide both parties with more insight into their activities

· To introduce the ACAP-INDEPTH collaboration to DSS sites in Tanzania who have not been part of the collaboration.

· To provide an update on the current status of the collaboration and discuss the way forward.

Identify ways of strengthening in-country collaboration under the ACAP-INDEPTH collaboration

Consider how best to take the agenda forward

The anticipated outputs of the meeting are:

agreement to get all DSS sites in Tanzania involved in the ACAP-INDEPTH collaboration
consensus on the unique data and results that will be generated, and agreement on how to work towards common protocols and methodologies; and data sharing
description of the structures, resources and funding needed to take this forward
a timetable for future activities and an activity plan