The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) has urged journalists to go beyond headlines and intensify scrutiny of development programmes to ensure interventions translate into tangible improvements in people’s lives.
It said the media had an important responsibility to examine policies, challenge assumptions, hold institutions accountable and highlight the experiences of women, girls and young people.
The UNFPA Country Representative, Dr Wilfred Ochan, made the call at the “Media Forum 2026: Conversations beyond the headlines” in Accra where he spoke on the topic, “Beyond the headlines: Partnership, trust and Ghana’s development story”.
He stressed that sustainable development required partnerships among government institutions, civil society organisations, traditional authorities, universities, young people and development partners.
Dr Ochan explained that although UNFPA provided technical expertise, policy advice and international experience, meaningful development depended on Ghana’s leadership, institutions and understanding of its social and cultural context.
He observed that effective partnerships should focus on achieving results that individual institutions could not deliver independently.
He further noted that development happened in communities, schools, markets and health facilities, where people experienced the impact of policies and interventions, rather than in offices or through announcements alone.
The Country Representative also highlighted the importance of collaboration between development institutions and the media, noting that journalists played a critical role in translating complex policies and statistics into information the public could understand.
He welcomed constructive scrutiny, describing trust, evidence and continuous engagement as essential to building a productive relationship with the media.
The Deputy Country Representative of UNFPA, Ms Emily Naphambo, in her presentation outlined Ghana’s eighth Country Programme, which commenced in 2023 and runs until 2027.
She explained that the programme was anchored on a central question of how to keep adolescent girls and young women alive and empower them to take charge of their futures.
The programme focuses on three areas: sexual and reproductive health services, gender and social norms, and adolescents and youth.
Ms Naphambo noted that improving access to quality healthcare, reproductive health information and contraceptives, alongside addressing harmful social norms, was essential to reducing adolescent pregnancies and maternal deaths.
She identified policy and accountability, humanitarian preparedness and resilience, and population data as cross-cutting priorities.
On the programme’s targets, she disclosed that unmet need for family planning was expected to decline from 29.9 per cent in 2022 to 10.5 per cent by 2027, while modern contraceptive prevalence was projected to increase from 25 to 40 per cent.
Skilled birth attendance was also expected to rise from 79 to 91 per cent, while maternal mortality was targeted to decline from 310 to 125 deaths per 100,000 live births.
Ms Naphambo urged journalists to assess progress against these targets, identify communities being left behind and examine gaps in funding and service delivery, keeping adolescent girls at the centre of their reporting.
The forum brought together journalists and stakeholders to discuss the need for stronger collaboration between the media and development institutions to ensure that policies and programmes were assessed not merely by their promises, but by their impact on the lives of women, girls and young people.
BY STEPHANIE BIRIKORANG
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