Abstract
BackgroundEthiopia, the second most populous country in Africa, has a total fertility rate of 4.6, a decrease from 5.5 in 2000. However, only 35.3% of women in the reproductive age group use modern family planning (FP) methods, and the 22.3% of them who have an unmet need for family planning is among the highest rates in sub-Saharan African countries. The Small, Happy, and Prosperous family in Ethiopia (SHaPE) is one of the country’s first comprehensive multimedia family planning campaigns. Its purpose is to increase FP-related knowledge, attitude, and practice of Ethiopians, particularly women of reproductive age.Methods/DesignThe SHaPE campaign has multiple components: (1) a nationwide representative survey, which serves as formative research to identify region-specific and culture-appropriate media, messages, and barriers and determinants of family planning; (2) a multimedia communication campaign intervention, including radio dramas and other interpersonal, community-level, and mass media channels; and (3) campaign evaluation, including pre-, process-, and post-evaluation research using both quantitative and qualitative methodologies. The main target population for SHaPE is reproductive age women and men in three regions: Amhara, Oromia, and Somali. These regions take up about 66.6% of the entire country and have distinct ethnicities, cultures, and languages.DiscussionSHaPE contributes to existing family planning research and intervention because it is theory- and evidence-based, and it employs integrated marketing communications and entertainment-education approaches with key messages that are tailored to audiences within unique cultures. But even within a country, a nationwide campaign with uniform messages is neither possible nor desirable due to different cultures, norms, and languages across regions. Last, media campaigns in developing and underdeveloped countries require constant monitoring of political situations.
Highlights
Ethiopia, the second most populous country in Africa, has a total fertility rate of 4.6, a decrease from 5.5 in 2000
SHaPE contributes to existing family planning research and intervention because it is theory- and evidence-based, and it employs integrated marketing communications and entertainment-education approaches with key messages that are tailored to audiences within unique cultures
Though, we focus only on the multimedia campaign protocol, divided into the following three components: (1) a nationwide representative survey serving as formative research to identify region-specific and culturally appropriate media, messages, and determinants of family planning; (2) the multimedia campaign intervention; (3) campaign evaluation, including pre, process, and post-evaluation research using both quantitative and qualitative methodologies
Summary
The second most populous country in Africa, has a total fertility rate of 4.6, a decrease from 5.5 in 2000. Only 35.3% of women in the reproductive age group use modern family planning (FP) methods, and the 22.3% of them who have an unmet need for family planning is among the highest rates in sub-Saharan African countries. As of 2017, Ethiopia, located in the Horn of Africa, is the continent’s second most populous country, with an estimated total population of over 100 million [6] It has one of the fastest growing economies in the world [7]. Only 35.3% of women in the reproductive age group have used modern family planning methods, and the unmet need for family planning is 22.3%, among the highest rate in sub-Sharan African countries [10, 11]. This unmet need for family planning, defined as “the condition of wanting to avoid or postpone childbearing but not using any method of contraception” [12], can be met through a strong family planning program that addresses people’s FP-related knowledge, beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors
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