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Social Mobilization and Social Marketing People's participation in achieving a specific developmental goal through self-reliant efforts is paramount to the success of any project or program. Since its inception, NTAG has been specializing in social mobilization and assisting organizations in mobilizing community volunteers, decision and policy makers, opinion leaders, professional groups, religious associations, communities and individuals to facilitate change. Furthermore, NTAG uses the social marketing techniques in creating demand among its target populations for health products, services and behaviors. NTAG’s approach to mobilizing social groups toward a common goal centers on a long-term vision of sustainability. Instead of using external incentives to spur social action, NTAG uses local resources and responds to local priorities to create incentives that fit in with existing systems and effect long-lasting social actions. Through its social mobilization work, NTAG internalizes a specific goal among local populations to create community involvement and ownership in the utilization of health services. NTAG has been instrumental in strengthening Nepal’s community health volunteer cadre, the Female Community Health Volunteers (FCHVs), who are credited for the successful implementation of community-based programs like NVAP, CB-IMCI, Iron Intensification, and others. For the past 15 years, NTAG was successful in maintaining high motivation of FCHVs, which resulted in exceptional coverage rates for a number of Nepal’s health programs, reaching particularly the underserved populations. In addition to motivating the FCHVs, NTAG mobilized community decision makers, opinion leaders, professional groups, and associations to support the FCHVs in their service delivery to the community. To create an independent local resource supporting the work of the FCHVs, NTAG developed the concept and provided technical support to MoHP, MoLD and local government committees for the implementation of the Female Community Health Volunteer Endowment Fund (FCHV-EF). The interest accrued from FCHV-EF enables to FCHVs to carry out routine activities and meetings, without the constraints of relying on outside funding. The FCHVs determine how the money is utilized through locally-formed management committees. With the same sensitivity and responsiveness to the local context, NTAG utilizes the social marketing principles to promote products and services that benefit the health of Nepal’s populations. NTAG increases the demand for key products and services among various populations by targeting its messages along the lines of the customers’ values and priorities. In this way, NTAG is able to reach the hearts of the people at whom the social marketing activities are directed.
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