Artikel Ilmu Komunikasi

In Bangladesh, through the negotiating skill of UNICEF staff various corporate partners come forward to associate themselves with what they considered a popular social movement. Their realized that if their products could be linked with Epi, their companies image would benefit. The first to come on-board was Dhaka. Match industries, partly owned by Swedish Match Company. Dhaka Match put the moni logo on the back of their “Seven Horses” brand which. at the most remote parts of the country.
The match-box created a wave of enthusiasm and many business house came forward. Bata Shoes Company donated space on their signs and shoes boxes. Fisons Bangladesh Ltd. Provided support in the form of counter displays and posters to 20.000 pharmacies which carried their products. Bangladesh Auto cars painted the Epi. logo on the body work of their public transport and Spark Ltd. displayed it on their cartons and boxes billboards. General Electric printed it on their cartons and boxes and Lever Brother produced a poster, free of charge, for their sales outlets. Dhaka University’s Institute Of Business Administration included corporate mobilization in its curriculum, a recognition of the efforts generated by Epi.

Partnership developed in one sector often lead to alliances in another. For example the editor of an entertainment weekly Ananda Bichitra played a major role in organizing a support group of entertainment stars who donate their time and images to assist the cause of children. Called “We Are For Children” its members posed for posters, addressed rallies, toured outlying areas, appeared in television spots and gave press interviews to support Epi. By publicly endorsing Epi they became highly-visible advocators for the programme. Community theatre groups also mounted plays in different parts of Bangladesh, supporting immunization and linking it with other social issues. Well-known theatre stars acted in these plays giving Epi high visibility and immediate recognition.
Star value was added in other ways too. In a country crazy about football, the captains of the two main rival teams posed for posters and acted in television spots, saying that while there is a rivalry in the field there is unity when it comes to children’s immunization. “Star” attraction peaked in 1989 when UNICEF Special Representative for Spots, International cricket Star Imran Khan, visited Bangladesh to promote Epi. Over 250 arcticles appeared in various Newspapers. He made the nightly news on both national radio and TV with commentary ranging from cricket. His material plans and of course Epi and children. He run a number of cricket sessions with young players and talked to huge crowds on the benefit of immunization.
The prestigious Dhaka Club not only hosted a fund-raising dinner in his honour, it also auctioned his bat and donated the proceeds to UNICEF. Rotarians, who were already partner on the programme through their PolioPlus Programme, gave a reception with the Vice President at host NGOs held a reception when Imran Khan addressed city volunteers for Epi, providing inspiration and recognition to the contribution made by the NGO sector.
UNICEF began to involved celebrities in raising awareness and funds for its programmes in 1945. Well-known entertainment personalities such as Danny Kaye, Sir Peter Ustinov, Liv Ullmann, Tetsuko Koroyanagi, Harry Belafonte, Sir Richard Attenborough, and Audrey Hepburn have travelled to many developing countries, often accompanied by local and international reporters and film and television crews. Besides Imran Khan, UNICEF has appointed other special representative such as Julio Iglesias, the Spanish singer; Youssou N’Dour, a popular musician from Senegal; and most recently, Roger Moore, and Sir Edmond Hillary, The presence of such personalities, on location and international attention on programme for children.
When Audrey Hepburn came to Bangladesh in October 1989 her highly profiled partly because her films are still popular amongst Bangladesh’s elite and partly because “We Are For Children” played host to her in Dhaka and made it into a star event. The largest single gathering of film stars in Bangladesh took place at the national film studio where she was received by Shabana, the top heroine of Bangladesh who had taken her tetanus shots on camera, appealing to all woman to do the same. Addressing Bangladesh’s largest ever gathering on United Nations Day, Audrey Hepburn created a sense of togetherness between the United Nations and the people of Bangladesh, symbolizing the joint effort to give the children of the world a better chance.
The visits of Imran Khan and Audrey Hepburn achieved a high level of advocacy, leading to Epi’s secure place on the Government’s agenda.

The support of the electronic media grew out of the links developed during the course of mobilizing the press. In November 1988, UNICEF commissioned a study by the Press Institute of Bangladesh on the feasibility of free commercial time on radio and television for child survival and development issues, with a special focus on Epi. The study entitled “Public Service Broadcasting: A Case for Bangladesh” was carried out by three well-known journalists, including, Shahidud Hug, the team leader and Editor of the Bangladesh Time, who also had served on the MacBride Commission on the New World Information Order, the conclusion of the study was that the cost of allotting free time would be greatly offset by the benefit s obtained in better service delivery in the health and welfare sector. In fact, the report became an advocacy tool which allowed UNICEF Executive Director, James P. Grant to successfully ask the Presiden of Bangladesh to grant three minutes of prime commercial time for children on radio and television every day.
Television spots on immunization became a common feature and in addition many regular programmes and documentaries were created on Epi by Government television and radio producers. They found time for Epi in programmes dealing with other issues such as family planning and the control of diarrhoeal diseases.

In 1987, when most of the service delivery was in place throughout the country, the Press Foundation of Asia, the Press Institute of Banglandesh and UNICEF launhed an introduction to EPI, creating a nationwide journalist network and encouraging an atmosphere of participation, learning and exchange. About the same time the DevPress project of the Association of the development Agencies in Banglandesh began to create a news netwok on EPI through the monthly distribution of press informations packets to the regional media. Soon a core group of supporters in the regional media were identified.
By 1990, EPI was no longer development news-filter. It became programme worth reporting on and debating. The press became a natural ally and a watch-dog. The initial poor coverage of EPI proved to be a positive factor in motivating the system to accelerate activities. Additional adrenalin was supplied by a revamped development features syndicate called Devfeatures, operated by the center for sustainable development. Building on accumulated experience, this organization created an active network of over 100 community and regional newspaper began to carry moni on their pages as part of their commitment.
These activities helped immensely in major national programme initiatives at the community level. At first they involved general advocacy on the goals of Epi and some of the technical issues involved as well as the need for community support. However as the programme evolved and the journalists understanding matured, event such as National Immunization Weeks were covered by the press and by radio and television news with little or no prodding by Government or UNICEF staff. Epi became one of the most intensively-covered health issues in the 40 dailies and 125 weeklies published in Bangladesh. This kind of general and somewhat uncontrolled advocacy by partners in the press was very important for sustaining a supportive environment in administrative and opinion-leadership cireles.

In 1985, the government of Banglandesh realized an Expanded Programme On Immunization (EPI) was needed to increase immunization coverage levels which had only reached two percent. It is decided that a revitalized plan of action was needed if UCI was to be achieved. New, service delivery was put onto place in a stage-by-stage manner over four years, beginning with eigth sundistricts and eventually all 460.
In may 1986, an EPI communication plan was finalized to support this expansion. This plan set out the major steps to be taken in accelerating demand for immunization by bringing together various social allies in a procces of social mobilization, a procces which facilitated one of the most successful social programmes in the history of Banglandesh.
In February 1991 and February 1992, two independent coverage evaluation surveys were carried out to determine the success of the programme. The result demonstrated that 62 and 65 percent of children of the target age group were fully immunized in 1990 and 1991, respectively as the demonstrated in the graph below. In addition. It was found that two out of four divisions of the country achieved Universal Child Immunization in 1991.
Achieving UCI in half the population of one of the most densely populated countries on earth represented a remarkable achievement for Banglandesh, a coutry which had never before broken the barrier of 33 percent coverage in social programmes. Achieving UCI is a starting point for the eradication or elimination of major diseases and for an overall improvement in material and child health and it is worthwhile reviewing what went into the social mobilization procces for EPI to determine what made the difference, how the programme can be sustained and what element can be applied to other programmes.
One of the first elements of the communication programme was the search for a symbol which people would recognize easlly. Since moni is aterm of endearment for children of both sexes, a character was drawn to suit the term. Six arrows, symbolizing the six immunizable diseases, and a ring symbolizing protection were added.
Moni became one of the most successful elements of EPI communication. In marketing terms it is a simple appealing and easily identifiable trade mark. Moni was placed just about every where to raise awareness and support demand creation.
The multiple uses of the moni logo were paralleled only by the multiple partners who came on-board to help create demand and implement the programme. Media in Banglandesh rapidly became an instrument for development during the period 1985-1990. Much of that development was a direct result of the activities involved in the EPI programme. Lets tis take a close look at how this happened.

The global programme launched by UNICEF and the world health Organization to immunize chilldren troughout the world is the greatest public health success story of the 1980s. By the and of the 1990, over 80 percent of under-one children had received immuniozation for five deadly diseases (tubercolosis, diphtheria, whooping cough, tetanus and polio) and 78 percent had received immuniozation against measles, probably the greatest killer of the children when combined with malnutrition, diarrhea and acute respiratory infection. It is estimated that, annually the programme is already saving 3,2 milion children from the premature death and 2 milion from the agonizing live of polio victim.
The Expanded Programme On Immunization (EPI) drew many lessons from the successful international campaign to eradicate smallpox. Althougt the concept of giving a protective inoculation of smallpox material was pradticed in China and West Africa for centuries, it was not until 1798 when Edward Jenner successfully experimented with a cowpox vaccine, that the seeds of widescale protection were planted. Smallpox did not discriminate community leaders were amongst the first to be vaccinated, a fact which helped accelerate its spread around the world within 10 years. However, massive vaccine production was not possible before 1842 and it was not until 1958. When the new ease of international travel brought with it the dengers of widespread infection, that a global vaccination and eradication programme was launched. The campaign involved massive immunization and surveillance and containment strategies supported by highly-developed logistics, information and communication system. In many area of the world, for the first time, the personnel and resources of government health structures were effectively energizeg and mobilized for a single goal within a giving time frame.
When the last ease of smallpos was reported and successfully isolated in Somalia. In October 1977, the success could not ignoreg. Many had claimed that the answer to solving the world’s helath problem was integrated health delivery and that vertical programmes, such as a drive to eradicate one disease, were discruptive ti this process. However, the fact speak for themselves. As late as 1967 it is estimated that there were 10 to 12 milio eases of smallpox in 33 countries, causing an estimated 2 milion deaths annually. By 1977, the scourge was erased from the face of the earth forever.
However, of the six deseases targeted by the global EPi programme, probably only polio can be totally eradicated of the other all but tetanus can be controlled by herd immunity the phenomenon of near-zero transmission rates which depend on coverage level of a least 80 percent. Otherwise know as Univesal Chilldren Immununization (UCI). Thefore, EPI had lesson to learn from the eradication of smallpox but could not take that experience as a total model to follow. Whereas smallpox vaccination is no longer necessary. At least 80 percent of newborns will have to be immunized each year for the foreseeable future. An important difference, therefore, is the need for sustained service delivery.
To many sustainability is equated with a fully-functioning, integrated, primary health care system supported an owned dy the community. However, when Epi began. The vaccines had been available for 20 years and still, two thirds of the world’s children had not been vaccinated. UnicevExecutive Director. James P.Grant. decided that taking the position “that universal immunization must await economic development and the coming of a permanent health clinic to every village is simply a sentence of unnecessary death and disability for many millions of today’s children and for even more millions of those who are still not born. There was, in other words a moral imperative to procced with an accelerated, vertical programme which could use many of the lessons of smallpox eradication but which would add another element, sustainability through social mobilization.
Through social mobilization, immunization breaks out of its “institutional and technical imprisonment” and “is debated by heads of state in international fora”. “is demanded by illiterate mothers and a wide spectrum of people” come to participate in its implementation. In social mobilization the concept of “the community” is expanded to include many social allies: heads of state and other political leaders, various ministries, district and local government authorities, community region leader, NGOs, service club, journalists, filmmakers, artists and enternainers to name the most common examples. In social mobilization in other words the procces take the programme beyong a vertical intervention directed by a single chain of command to horizontally spreading currents of energy which eventually cover most of a society. In this way a vertical programme becomes horizontal.
There are many experiences with social mobilization for EPI to draw upon. I will narrate the story of social mobilization in Banglandesh draw some conclusions and then synthesize some experiences with EPI anf other health and nutrition programmes in the final section of this chapter.

SOCIAL MOBILIZATION FOR CHILD SURVIVAL AND DEVELOPMENT

In chapter two and three, I concluded that social marketing efforts in health and family planning have only been able to complement other initiatives and that on closer analysis, some of the most successful experiences in social marketing have relied very much on interpersonal communication and motivational effort by community-based workers and volunteers. The participation of the local community is essential. However a missing element in these projects has been the participation of the larger community: the mobilization of various support groups and the organizations to ensure programme goals are understood and accepted widely. This is the essence of social mobilization. A concept which I have outlined in Chapter one and for which I repeat the definition here:
Social mobilization is the process of bringing together all feasible and practical later-sectoral social allies to raise people’s awareness of the demand for a particular development programme to assist in delivery of the resources and services and to strengthen community participation for sustainability and self-reliance.
To some, “mobilization” has s very military ring to it and may bring to mind forced literacy and family palnning campaigns, or the collectivization of Chinese, Tanzanian or Ethiopian villages. As outlined in chapter one, the origin of the concept is not clear. However, adding the “social” dimension to “mobilization” implies an element of choise and active partipation. The terms has not been derived from the pen of the development philosopher. Rather, it has been synthesized from various experiences in health population, nutrition, literacy, and enveiromental programmes.
Instcad of worrying more about derivationsand cefenitions, it would be more useful to discover how the concept has evolved in the context of the of largest and most successful health programmes of this century.