Workshop aims to disseminate research findings on sexual, reproductive health

AMMAN — The Higher Population Council (HPC) and the Share-Net Jordan/Knowledge Platform for Reproductive Health Research on Tuesday held a workshop to launch the results of reproductive health-related studies conducted over the past two years. 

The workshop, conducted in cooperation with the Dutch Research Council’s Science for Global Development (NWO-WOTRO), saw the participation of research project teams, reproductive health service providers, representatives from the media, policy-makers from relevant national institutions and youth, according to an HPC statement made available to The Jordan Times.

The two-year funded research projects, which were launched in September 2017, covered a variety of topics. Among them was the study "Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights of Women and Young People in Jordan: A Mixed Methods Study Using Interactive Theatre" implemented by the National Centre for Culture and Arts. 

Another study carried out by the American University of Beirut focused on "Understanding and Meeting the Sexual and Reproductive Health Needs of Jordanian and Syrian Youth”, in addition to a collaborative research project carried out between Harvard University, the Jordan Hashemite Fund for Human Development and WOTRO. Other funded research focused on the reproductive health of refugee female youth and early marriages among refugees, according to the statement.

The event included a panel discussion titled "Promoting reproductive health in Jordan and how research can contribute to better policies and practices", which discussed the results of these studies with the aim of producing policy briefs formulated by relevant national institutions and experts in reproductive health together with policy-makers and practitioners. 

Another goal of the workshop was to make recommendations for the dissemination of research findings and to facilitate knowledge exchange on evidence-based policy making, improving and enhancing the use of research findings to enhance the knowledge of sexual and reproductive health in Jordan, the statement said.  

Coordinator for Share-Net Jordan Ali Al Metleq confirmed that this meeting comes within the framework of the Share-Net’s follow-up on the knowledge platform for the research projects, and making the best use of research results to achieve national goals. 

He highlighted the need to strengthen and disseminate reproductive health research findings to expand the knowledge of policy makers to support evidence-based decision making, according to the statement. 

Coordinator for the Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights branch of the NWO-WOTRO programme Gerrie Tuitert stressed the importance of stimulating the exchange of knowledge coming from the results of studies with relevant actors and of conveying these findings to policy-makers and involving them in the formulation of policy briefs.

The HPC hosts the Share-Net Jordan hub, which aims to establish an interactive online platform to support reproductive health research with the participation of relevant partners in different sectors, facilitate knowledge-building and dissemination in this field and build the capacity of key partners to identify knowledge gaps, according to the statement. 

Dutch institutions are providing a number of grants to Jordan to carry out research and studies on various reproductive health topics in cooperation with Jordanian and international academic institutions, the statement said.