The intervention
The intervention phase spanned 8 months comprising six key activities specifically a 5-day training programme and identification of key reproductive health needs in the states , mentoring, conduct of advocacy visits, for-mation and registration of state advocacy networks, monitoring and consultative meetings.
The 5-day training programme conducted for repre-sentatives of the selected NGOs lasted an average of 8 h daily. The activities were aimed at updating know-ledge & strengthening the skills of trainees on advocacy issues. Thirty six participants attended the workshop. The capacity building programme focused on issues in reproductive health, steps in Advocacy process, policy issues, gender issues, courting the media, resource mobilization, networking, partnership and leadership issues. A main outcome of the training programmes was the ability of the participants to identify key RH issue in the project states using a Participatory Learning approach-
“The Pair Wise Ranking of Needs”. The Pair wise ranking is a structured method for ranking a small list of items in priority order. It can help in prioritizing a small list as well as make decisions in a consensus-oriented manner [24]. To conduct the pair wise ranking, participants identified a maximum of 7 key reproductive health issues in their states using free listing. A pairwise matrix was constructed and each box in the matrix represented the intersection or pairing of two items. The team began the process by using consensus to determine which of the paired item had the most significant impact on the reproductive health status of populace using the following criteria rate of occurrence, outcome of the reproductive health issue and the age groups affected. The process was repeated until the matrix was completed. The RH issue with the highest frequency was identified as the key RH issue of significance in the state. Key reproductive health issues identified by each state are as outlined. Ogun state: Inclusion of Family Life HIV/AIDS Education (sexuality education) in curricula at all levels and the provision of Youth friendly services. Kwara State: Inclusion of Family Life HIV/ AIDS Education (sexuality education) in curricula at all levels. Osun state: Reduction of maternal morbidity and mortality through the provision of Emergency Obstetric care at the primary and secondary health care facilities.
A 6-month work plan indicating the advocacy goal, objectives, activities, target audiences and timeline was developed in line with the key RH issues identified. This served as a guide for the conduct of subsequent advo-cacy activities in the project states. Two approaches were utilized in the conduct of the advocacy visits i.e. conduct of advocacy visits by the networks and joint advocacy visits by ARFH staff and the Networks. The target audiences for these advocacy activities were the legislators, policy makers, traditional, religious and