In Africa, more than four in every 10 women of reproductive age want to avoid pregnancy. However, 47% of African women who do not want to become pregnant either use no contraceptive method or use traditional methods, which typically have low levels of effectiveness.
These women who are defined as having an unmet need for modern contraception, account for 90% of all unintended pregnancies in Africa. If all unmet need were satisfied, there would be a decline of about 80% in the annual number of unintended pregnancies, unplanned births, and abortions.
Recent analyses recognize the unique and vital role of the church and faith-based groups in successful developmental work in developing countries. World Vision uses a faith-based delivery methodology called Channels of Hope (CoH) to promote use of FP through messages on healthy timing and spacing of pregnancy (HTSP).
With funding from the John Templeton Foundation, World Vision implemented a three-year operational research project to measure change in contraceptive prevalence rate (CPR) among women of reproductive age in communities where faith leaders—Christian and Muslim—were exposed to the CoH maternal, newborn, and child health (MNCH)+HTSP training, as compared to a comparable community without CoH MNCH+HTSP interventions. Ghana and Kenya were chosen for their levels of need, ready organizational infrastructure, and mixed faith populations.