African broadcasters drive 2010 HIV-prevention initiative

Fifty-nine public and private African broadcast media companies with a prospective audience in excess of 200 million have committed airtime and production resources to support a special continent-wide HIV prevention drive capitalising on the excitement surrounding the first African Soccer World Cup. Using the tagline "Football For an HIV-Free Generation," this new pan-African initiative uses soccer as the entry point for an evidence-based strategy that draws on best practice for HIV-prevention, youth communication and sports for development.

The unprecedented pan-African coalition of broadcast companies, operating as the African Broadcast Media Partnership Against HIV/AIDS (ABMP), is committed to developing and broadcasting HIV/AIDS-related programming in association with 2010 broadcasts and to sustaining the campaign across their general daily program schedules as well. The media campaign will be anchored by public service announcements for radio and TV which will launch on World AIDS Day (December 1, 2008), and will be reinforced by longer form programming including the popular Imagine Afrika reality show, as well as talk and magazine shows.

The Football for an HIV-Free Generation initiative uses media as the bridge to community-level outreach programs for youth including educational, leadership and life skills development. This effort aims to:

• Help accelerate reductions in the rate of HIV infection among young Africans;
  
• Re-engage young people across Africa in the fight against HIV/AIDS;
  
• Help boost leadership and increased country-level focus and funding of more concerted large scale HIV-prevention across Africa.

UNAIDS executive director, Dr. Peter Piot said: “Soccer offers an exciting platform for intensifying HIV prevention efforts across Africa helping promote self-esteem and supporting the development of protective communication and life skills. Combining soccer with community-based programmes and intensive media outreach will give a welcome boost to ongoing HIV prevention work on the continent and will be particularly powerful in the months building up to the first World Cup to be hosted in Africa.”

By building on the existing expertise and infrastructure of established organisations and local partners, this initiative will use a large-scale pan-African approach to mobilise youth across the continent in support of the goal of an HIV-free generation. This will be achieved through a three-pronged strategy that includes:

Community-based model: Community-based outreach and services component will build on the successful models developed by Grassroots Soccer and loveLife that use soccer as a tool for HIV-prevention education. The initiative will expand through a social franchising model partnering with and using peer motivation and youth leadership development to build the capacity of existing local community-based organisations. An initial focal point of the initiative will be to support the educational content of the Football For Hope Centres that are being donated in 15 African countries as part of FIFA's "20 Centres for 2010 Campaign".

Sustained media campaign: Implemented in partnership with the African Broadcast Media Partnership Against HIV/AIDS (ABMP) — a pan-African coalition of 59 broadcast companies operating across 37 countries — the media campaign will build on the commitment of airtime and other resources from the broadcast companies to develop media programming that connects with the synergies of the 2010 World Cup, as well as the ABMP's existing campaign promoting the concept of an HIV-free generation.

Advocacy, partnership and resource development: Evidence shows that resources for effective HIV-prevention are severely lacking. A concerted advocacy campaign to promote new leadership in support of more concerted HIV-prevention and increased resources (in-country and international) will be driven by UNAIDS, and CSI+ with the aim of encouraging scaled up prevention across Africa.

For more information go to www.broadcasthivafrica.org and www.F4hivfree.org.