Value for Money: An Agenda for Global Health Funding Agencies

As international commitments become more ambitious and aid resources become increasingly constrained, global health funding agencies are seeking to improve the efficiency and impact of their investments. This growing “value for money” (V4M) agenda aims to reduce costs, increase impact per dollar spent and focus investments on the highest impact interventions among the most affected populations.

V4M encompasses four main dimensions: (1) technical efficiency, (2) productive efficiency, (3) allocative efficiency and (4) institutional incentives. Each dimension operates at the global, national and subnational levels, and depend on the decisions and actions of many inter-connected entities before they can produce a desired health outcome. In global health, funding agencies are often the only mechanisms available to influence improved efficiency and their tools are limited - comprised primarily of funds, management and incentives, technical assistance, economies of scale, measurement and accountability.

The Center for Global Development (CGD) will apply its working group approach to analyze evidence, pose questions and offer high impact recommendations to improve V4M in global health funding agencies. This initiative is led by Amanda Glassman, CGD director of Global Health Policy and research fellow. Senior Fellow, Mead Over and Research Fellow, Victoria Fan will also collaborate.

This work follows previous CGD efforts relating to value in the global health sector, such as the Priority-Setting Institutions for Global Health and Future of the Global Fund working groups and publications including Achieving an AIDS Transition, The Health Systems Funding Platform,  and Performance Incentives for Global Health.

Global Health Policy