World Bank / IMF Spring Meeting Participation

Ms. Angela Chester Johnson and Dr. Conrado Ordonez, board members represented our organization at the spring meeting. We had earlier been invited to the World Bank Board of Governors meeting held in Tokyo Japan Oct, 2012, We are also member of the Bank Global Partnership for Social Accountability (GPSA) – is a coalition of donors, governments and CSO partners launched by the World Bank in 2012 with the goal to improve development results by supporting capacity building for enhanced citizen feedback and participation. As part of its focus is the provision of strategic long-term support to civil society organizations that strive to provide social accountability programs.

Our participation was also driven by the issues of Counterfeit Medicines (also referred to as spurious, falsely labeled, falsified, counterfeit medicines/SFFC) reached such a level of public health impact to become an obstacle to development, negatively affecting development of  societies, and particularly the poor. Counterfeiting and similar crimes affect all medical products, whether they are generic or protected by intellectual property rights IPRs. Data from the Pharmaceutical Security Institute indicates that the illegal trade and manufacture of medicines affected at least 124 countries in 2011, and the burden is disproportionately felt in the developing world.

Over 700 CSO representatives from 100 countries participated, the largest Civil Society Program, held on April 15 – 20, comprised 60 dialogue sessions involving over 200 CSO, Bank, and Fund speakers. Most of the sessions were organized by CSOs, and topics included: WB safeguards review, post-MDGs agenda, IMF economic policies, gender mainstreaming, and climate change. There were also a number of high-level meetings with World Bank President Jim Kim,  IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde, and UN General Secretary Ban ki-moon, as well as a CSO Roundtable with Bank Executive Directors. According to Dr. Ordonez, the dialogue was an absolutely amazing and unforgettable experience. He was able to network with several people and made a connection with a physician from Bangladesh that would be willing to provide PROFOH with assistance if we ever decide to venture to their region. We would like other PROFOH members to participate in next upcoming Annual Meetings in October; PROFOH has just received a THANK YOU letter from the World Bank Group/IMF for participation in the 2013 IMF/World Bank Spring Meetings.