"Come, Let’s Talk" - India
Regions
Global, Africa, South Asia
This campaign is an intensive interpersonal and mass media effort designed to destigmatise and mainstream discussion on family planning in the state of Uttar Pradesh, India. The theme of the campaign, "Come, Let's Talk" uses the traditional symbols of the parrot and the mynah birds drawn from ancient storytelling forms in India.
Communication Strategies
Strategy includes: training of service providers, traditional media groups and mass media, monitoring and evaluation. It is based on some of the key tenets of the Programme of Action from the Cairo ICPD Conference: free and informed choice, a Target-Free Approach and an emphasis on spacing methods of birth control among younger couples with a low parity. Activities and materials include: Interpersonal Communication (IPC) materials (calenda, posters, stickers, bag, desk calendar, mailer-cum-wall-chart), IPC training and orientation of field staff, folk media (the nautanki, the quawali, puppetry and allaha/bifha), Mass media campaign (radio and TV), tracking and evaluation. Target audience is couples from 17-25 years old currently not using contraceptives.
Development Issues
Family planning, population.
Key Points
Uttar Pradesh in north India is the most populous state in India. In terms of population, the state is larger than all but six countries in the world. Uttar Pradesh is a tradition-bound state, with some of the poorest socio-economic indicators in the country. The campaign is probably the first comprehensive and scientifically designed communication intervention in family planning in India.
Partners
A project of the State Innovations in Family Planning Services (SIFPSA) project supported by USAID with technical assistance from the Johns Hopkins University/ Population Communications Services.
