On 15-24 July 2013, three 3-day back-to-back trainings on introduction of CHANNEL software are being held in Tashkent with the participation of specialists from selected district branches of National Reproductive Health Centre, chief district and provincial pharmacists. In the coming months UNFPA to further expand the training on CHANNEL for district level health care specialists involved in SRH and in charge of contraceptives logistics in order to introduce CHANNEL software system as as an important tool for national contraceptive logistics management information system.

CHANNEL is a computer software program for managing health supplies. The system allows individual warehouses to track their supply stock as soon as commodities enter or leave storage, and to generate simple reports and requests. The software is meant to automate the data collection and reporting requirements of the facilities at which it is used, while assisting and encouraging good practices in logistics and supply management. Any number and type of commodities can be managed by the system, including essential drugs, vaccines, and medical supplies. This make the software flexible and suitable to accommodate management of health supplies in general. CHANNEL is user-friendly enough for locations where computer skills and capacity are minimal, while capturing the most critical information about health supply stocks in order to avoid stock-outs.

In close collaboration with the Ministry of Health, UNFPA has achieved significant results in introduction and implementation of contraceptive logistics management information system (CLMIS) in Uzbekistan. Since pilot project initiation in Fergana in 2005, UNFPA was able to persuade the Ministry of Health to start nationwide introduction of the logistics system for contraceptives supply, registration, recording and distribution. UNFPA facilitates the Ministry of Health’s efforts through provision of capacity building, procurement of essential equipment, monitoring and assessments of its implementation. The 2012 update of the Ministerial Order on CLMIS resulted in simplification and rationalization of stock keeping procedures at all levels of the contraceptives’ distribution. In the recent year UNFPA was able to mobilize additional resources from UNFPA Global program on Reproductive Health Commodity Security to procure IT equipment for the establishment of CHANNEL software at district and provincial levels.

The UNFPA has been supporting the government’s efforts to improve the welfare of citizens since 1993. Under its third country programme (2010-2015), the UNFPA continues to focus on promoting reproductive health and rights, ensuring full implementation of women’s and men’s rights, opportunities, and responsibilities, and advancing national capacities to use population data for development programmes. The UNFPA has helped to strengthen healthcare policies and frameworks, provide essential equipment, and build the capacity of medical personnel. The latter has been achieved through training more than 10,000 healthcare providers on different aspects of reproductive health and rights.