On Wednesday December 18, the World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors approved the Second Additional Financing to the Tajikistan Health Services Improvement Project.
A US$10 million grant will be provided to Tajikistan, according to the World Bank’s website.
The objective of the additional financing is in scaling up activities related to the improvement of the coverage and quality of basic primary health care services in selected districts of Tajikistan.
The Tajikistan Health Services Improvement Project, which was officially launched in May 2014, aims to improve the quality of health services for the population. Initial project funding was 19.8 million USD.
This US$19.8 million grant aimed to improve maternal and child health outcomes by providing incentive payments for better performance in coverage and quality of basic primary health care services in rural health facilities of Tajikistan.
The Project seeks to increase the coverage and quality of basic primary health care services through result-based financing (RBF). RBF is a change from paying for inputs, such as training and equipment, to paying for results achieved, such as the number of fully vaccinated children, the number of malnourished children properly counseled, the number of pregnant women fully covered with antenatal care and women who have given birth covered with postnatal care, the number of hypertensive patients detected and registered, and others. It helps countries get more from their own and donors’ funds: early research shows that countries that use RBF can get 20 percent more health care for the same amount of money with a higher quality of care.
The first phase of the implementation has begun in Spitamen district of Sughd province. Starting in early 2015, implementation was scaled up to seven additional districts, covering a total of 1.86 million people in eight districts of Khatlon and Sughd provinces and representing around 25 percent of the population.
On June 22, 2015, the World Bank Board of Executive Directors approved an allocation of additional financing of US$10 million from the International Development Association for the Tajikistan Health Services Improvement Project.
