1. What is the National Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) System for HIV and AIDS?
Those involved in funding, planning, or coordinating programmes and projects not only need to implement them, but also need to assess the progress made during implementation. This will assist those involved to improve the way in which they plan and implement and coordinate projects and programmes. For such assessments, a monitoring and evaluation system is useful.

The National Monitoring and Evaluation System for HIV and AIDS (M&E System) is presented in the document 'M&E system for HIV and AIDS: Operations Manual.' It defines the way in which the country will assess its multisectoral response to HIV and AIDS. Swaziland's multisectoral response to HIV and AIDS is outlined in the country's Second National Multisectoral HIV and AIDS Strategic Plan for 2006 to 2008 (NSP), and covers the thematic areas of:

  • Prevention of HIV infection
  • Care and support of those infected with HIV
  • Mitigating the impact of HIV and AIDS on all sectors
  • Managing and coordinating the national multisectoral response

2. Purpose of the national M&E System for HIV and AIDS
The National M&E System for HIV and AIDS has more than one purpose:

  • Firstly, to track the extent to which the goals and objectives of Swaziland's multisectoral response to HIV and AIDS, as formulated in the NSP, have been achieved;
  • Secondly, to ensure that HIV and AIDS M&E results are disseminated results;
  • Thirdly, to ensure that results are used when decisions about HIV and AIDS interventions are made at national, regional and global events.

All of these should result in an improvement in the multisectoral response to HIV and AIDS in Swaziland.

3. What is the Operational Framework for the M&E System?
The operational framework of this system has been illustrated in . This figure illustrates that the system consists of a set of INDICATORS (A) at impact, outcome, output, and input level. It also contains DATA SOURCES (B) that are used to provide indicator values on a regular basis. A data source may provide information for more than one indicator. Then, it contains a description of all INFORMATION PRODUCTS (C) - regular, routine reports produced by NERCHA - to communicate M&E results. Finally, the M&E System defines the HIV and AIDS STAKEHOLDERS (D) to whom information products will be disseminated.

HIV and AIDS stakeholders are those persons or organisations that:

  • are involved in implementing the national HIV response;
  • are funding aspects of the HIV response;
  • benefit directly from the implementation of the national HIV response; or
  • whose interests are positively or negatively affected by the HIV response.

 

4. What data will be collected though the M&E System?
Indicators have been developed, using international HIV and AIDS M&E indicator guidelines published by WHO and UNAIDS, for all thematic areas of the NSP. The national set of 88 HIV and AIDS indicators define the data sets that are required for tracking the national multisectoral response to HIV and AIDS. In terms of the impact and outcomes of the NSP, data will be collected about the spread of the HIV epidemic, about changes in behavior that could promote the spread of HIV and AIDS, about the impact of HIV care, support and treatment activities, about attitudes relating to HIV and AIDS, and about the outcome of impact mitigation activities.

In terms of tracking the outputs generated by those strategies defined by NSP, the M&E System will collect data relating to HIV and AIDS interventions: the number of persons that have been reached, the number of venues and/or organisations providing a specific service, and the number of persons trained to provide a specific service.

5. How will HIV and AIDS Stakeholders benefit from the M&E System?
The M&E System will:

stakeholder_benefits

6. What are the roles of HIV and AIDS Stakeholders in the M&E System?
First, all HIV and AIDS stakeholders will be encouraged to use the results generated by the M&E system when planning and implementing HIV and AIDS interventions, so that they may improve them.

Second, all implementers of HIV and AIDS interventions will need to provide data on the HIV and AIDS interventions that they are implementing. This data will need to be reported to NERCHA on a regular basis. To make it easy to report, NERCHA has developed a standard reporting system - Swaziland's HIV and AIDS Programme Monitoring System (SHAPMoS).

7. What is SHAPMoS?
SHAPMoS is a paper-based, recurrent data collection system for all non-health HIV/AIDS programme monitoring data that the national set of HIV/AIDS indicators require. It involves all implementers of HIV interventions completing a quarterly report form - the SHAPMoS Form. The Ministry of Health and Social Welfare (MoHSW) will not report on SHAPMoS; they will report through their own system, and simply submit summary data to NERCHA on health-related indicators. All details about SHAPMoS reporting may be found in the SHAPMoS Guidelines.

NERCHA will capture, analyse and interpret the data on SHAPMoS Forms every quarter. NERCHA will use the SHAPMoS data to prepare a Quarterly Service Coverage Report (QSCR). This QSCR will contain quarterly data about where what kind of HIV interventions were delivered. The QSCR will be desegregated by region, so that it can be used by regional-level stakeholders as well. The QSCR will be disseminated every quarter at a regional HIV and AIDS feedback workshop.

8. Where can I get more information?
Consult the guidelines and plans, OR contact:

The National M&E Coordinator
National Emergency Response Council on HIV and AIDS
Tel: (+268) 404 1720 / 1703
Fax: (+268) 404 1692,
Email: info@nercha.org.sz
Postal Address: PO Box 1937, Mbabane, Swaziland