An opportunity to bring Civil Society together on Access to Treatment

The Roundtable Process (RTP) is a unique opportunity for Civil Society (CS) to build a process for linking and learning in a systematic way. It aims to improve the response to HIV/AIDS; not through another organization or formal structure, but through the establishment of a more informal, results-oriented process, focusing on bringing together CS experts around challenges and themes as identified by the stakeholders themselves. In doing so, the Round Table Process provides a space for developing a Civil Society-owned agenda on access to HIV treatment.

The RTP is an opportunity for the stakeholders:

- to meet, to learn, to share, to think;
- to establish continuity in shared efforts;
- to establish collaboration based on comparative
  strengths;
- to further develop a civil society advocacy
  agenda in a systematic way;
- to create scale where needed (in procurement,
  advocacy etc);
- to reach out more effectively to other stake-
  holders (including governments);
- to create a stronger and shared voice;
- to seek for additional funding collaboratively for
  existing and new programs.

Based on a small survey sent out to stakeholders active in access to treatment, five themes were identified to be discussed at the first Roundtable Meeting: stigma & discrimination, sustainability of funding, treatment preparedness, procurement and gender dynamics. These themes are merely vehicles to facilitate discussion on the overall civil society agenda, to bring gaps in our current efforts to light, and to identify issues that are currently missing from our joint response, which could then be addressed through the RTP. The first Roundtable meeting itself will define the issues the RTP will work on in the future.

Background
The principle of the RTP is to have a broad selection of civil society stakeholders who own and drive the process and content of the Roundtable Meetings. Key stakeholders have been identified early in 2006. The strategic choice is made to build on existing civil society infrastructure and therefore work with the international networks, who then, through their structures, involve civil society at regional, national and local levels.

An inaugural meeting was organized during the International AIDS Conference in Toronto in August 2006. At this meeting, the participating stakeholders expressed their interest in the Roundtable Process, and confirmed that the program offers unique opportunities for civil society.

The Roundtable Process (RTP) is funded by the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs (as a component of the LAASER project around resistance, that is carried out by PharmAccess Foundation, TREAT Asia and Aids Fonds) and provides the necessary means for a series of Roundtable meetings for a period of five years, and secretarial and logistical support by the ICSS team.