CALL FOR CONSULTANT
Building an Evidence Base for Public Pharma in Africa: Policy Analysis and Case Study Series
Issued by: People’s Health Movement (PHM) Global Public Pharma Project.
Background
Over the past three years, the People’s Health Movement has been implementing a funded global project entitled ´Alternative approaches to Pharmaceutical Research, Productions, Access - strengthening public R&D in the health sector´. The project is commonly referred to as the ‘Public Pharma’ project and aims to advocate for a state-led, people-centered model for the research, development, manufacturing, and distribution of health technologies.
To date, a document outlining PHM’s bold vision for Public Pharma has been developed and is available from the PHM website here: https://phmovement.org/public-pharma. The vision of Public Pharma, importantly, encompasses all health technologies - including those linked to traditional medicine systems.
PHM supported Public Pharma advocacy activities are underway in Europe and in Latin America - with activities being initiated in Africa and India more recently (April and June 2026).
To complement its public education and advocacy work, the Public Pharma project is also developing an evidence base on Public Pharma. To date, two case studies have been developed: one of the state-owned Apotek Produktion & Laboratorier (APL) in Sweden and the other on the development process of the messenger RNA platform at Bio-Manguinhos/Fiocruz in Brazil.
We would now like to extend this evidence-base work to the African region, and require the technical expertise of a colleague, a consultant and/or an organization to conduct the following piece of research and documentation work.
Scope of Work: Policy analysis and case studies of Public Pharma in the African region
We are proposing that there are two key components of the work that is required of the consultant: firstly, to conduct a policy analysis and secondly, to identify and document interesting examples of Public Pharma across the African region.
Part A: Regional policy analysis
A policy analysis examining the key regional frameworks and plans that have sought to catalyse local pharmaceutical and medical consumable production on the African continent. Relevant documents include, but are not limited to, the Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Plan for Africa (NEPAD, 2007) and the Partnership for African Vaccine Manufacturing (PAVM) Framework for Action (Africa CDC, 2022). Related initiatives such as the African Pooled Procurement Mechanism (APPM) and the regulatory reform associated with the African Medicines Agency (AMA) might be relevant for their impact on regulatory and market dynamics. The analysis should examine how public ownership has been proposed and institutionalised within these frameworks, including public-private partnership models and other arrangements, and highlight key policy and implementation challenges, and areas of tension. It should then critically engage with these findings from a Public Pharma perspective, drawing on the PHM Public Pharma policy framework.
Part B: A series of case studies illustrating examples of Public Pharma in Africa
The second part of the consultancy would include the documentation of a series of case study examples of publicly owned or publicly oriented pharmaceutical and medical consumable production companies / institutions / collectives on the African continent.
The choice and number of case studies will be decided on jointly with PHM at the start of the consultancy. Some indicative examples could include:
● North Africa: Holdipharm and Vacsera (Egypt)
● Southern Africa: Afrigen and BioVac (South Africa)
● West Africa: Institut Pasteur de Dakar, including the MADIBA Project and AfricAmaril (Senegal)
● East Africa: Kilinto Special Export Zone (Ethiopia)
● Continental initiatives: Africa CDC as an intergovernmental organisation involved in shaping manufacturing OR the African Medicines Agency as an intergovernmental agency involved in strengthening public regulatory capacity on the continent.
Each case study should document the institutional history, ownership model, production capacity, and any relevant policy or political context, and engage critically with what “public” means in each instance - and, where appropriate, pick up on aspects that are aligned (or not) to the PHM Public Pharma policy framework.
Anticipated process of the consultancy
The consultant will work in close collaboration with the PHM Public Pharma (South Africa) working group (Lauren Paremoer, Nikki Schaay, Anneleen De Keukelaere and Peter van Heusden), and would likely involve the following process:
● An initial briefing session and discussion on what has been proposed by PHM - and what aspects require more consideration, change and/or refinement,
● A follow-up meeting(s) to finalize the analytical approach and the scope of the work and to finalize the terms of reference for this piece of work,
● Regular meetings to discuss emerging findings, to identify additional policies, literature and case studies (where appropriate), and to monitor progress.
More formally, we would expect that the consultant will:
- Develop a proposed analytical framework for the policy analysis and for the series of case studies, along with a realistic timeline which enables the findings to feed into related regional activities of PHM.
- Carry out the research and the documentation in line with the agreed upon framework and scope, and timelines - and participate in regular check-ins with the PHM working group.
- Provide input and contribute to discussions on the dissemination of the findings of this research among PHM membership, allied organisations, sympathetic policy-makers, and through social media channels.
Expected output
An accessible regional policy analysis and a series of case studies documenting the historical and contemporary evidence base for Public Pharma in Africa, produced under the PHM banner and widely disseminated to key stakeholders.
Timeline
We would like the consultant to start as soon as possible, and ideally complete the work in three months (ie. by end October 2026).
Other practicalities
This call is open to suitably qualified persons with expertise in this field - who might be an independent researcher/ consultant, or a staff member of a research organization. Those with a background in health policy, political economy of health, public health, pharmaceutical public health, health policy and systems research, or African health governance are particularly encouraged to apply.
If you are interested in this consultancy and would like to discuss more of the practical details (eg. budget, timeframe, TOR etc), please contact: Nikki Schaay, PHM Public Pharma Project: Cell: 084-211-5544 and Email: schaay@mweb.co.za