The Communication Initiative
Development action with informed and engaged societies
The Communication Initiative
After nearly 28 years, The Communication Initiative (The CI) Global is entering a new chapter. Following a period of transition, the global website has been transferred to the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa, where it will be administered by the Social and Behaviour Change Communication Division. Wits' commitment to social change and justice makes it a trusted steward for The CI's legacy and future.
 
Co-founder Victoria Martin is pleased to see this work continue under Wits' leadership. Victoria knows that co-founder Warren Feek (1953–2024) would have felt deep pride in The CI Global's Africa-led direction.
 
We honour the team and partners who sustained The CI for decades. Meanwhile, La Iniciativa de Comunicación (CILA) continues independently at lainiciativadecomunicacion.com and is linked with The CI Global site.
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twinning against AIDS Final Report: Background

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Why twinning against AIDS?

For those not familiar with Twinning in the context of HIV/AIDS it is an approach that enables organisations to share lessons and experience more widely and to support each other while seeking ways to act more effectively in their own communities. Twinning has been supported by CIDA and ICAD for several years through a programme initiative that provides support and funding for formal contracted twinning projects. Within this programme Twinning has been defined as a formal, substantive collaboration between two or more organisations anywhere in the world. It is a process in which AIDS Service Organisations (ASO's), NGO's, research and other institutions come together to contribute to each others work and to learn from each other's experiences. Such formal twinning processes have enabled organisations to come together to:

  • improve awareness and understanding of the legal, ethical and human rights impact of the global spread of HIV/AIDS;
  • enhance skills in human rights fact-finding and documentation;
  • share practical prevention materials and innovative intervention strategies;
  • provide opportunities for on-site, informal staff training to enhance work with common client populations;
  • monitor and document examples of informal repression in Africa;
  • learn more about publicity and media work, campaigning, mobilising legal support and reporting for domestic and international audiences;
  • transport surplus HIV/AIDS medications and other medical supplies;
  • develop a training programme on modern management principles;
  • enhance capacity to conduct investigations into abuses of women's rights,
  • and apply international human rights standards to monitoring and assessing state and private sector accountability for abuses.


The lessons learned from these and other twinning experiences were brought together in the 1999 publication Beyond Our Borders: A Guide to Twinning for HIV/AIDS Organizations prepared by Health Canada and ICAD. In December 2001 a group of organisations from North and South America and the Caribbean involved or interested in HIV/AIDS twinning processes came together to further discuss how twinning partnerships could be improved, expanded and sustained over time. There was general consensus at this meeting that while individual twinning projects were very positive for the organisations involved a number of questions remained that needed to be addressed:

  • how could the lessons learned in specific twinning projects be shared beyond the actual participants?
  • how could these be archived in such a way that they were accessible to anyone?
  • how could the linkages and communication established during twinning projects be continued in a cost-effective manner past the end of formal project funding?
  • how could less formal forms of information sharing also be supported?
  • how could more organisations become involved in the process without vastly increasing its funding?
  • how could twinning be used to support more south to south and south to north exchange?


All these questions seemed to have at least partial answers in the more effective use of information and communication technologies (ICTs). During this meeting the group asked ICAD to lead a process to examine how ICTs could be used to facilitate and enhance twinning partnerships amongst organisations responding to the AIDS crisis around the world. ICAD, in partnership with CI, under the guidance of a Steering Committee with global representation, and with financial support from CIDA, began a process to determine how best to use ICTs for sustained twinning partnerships and improved communication of the lessons learned and skills shared.