The ACET International Conference was held from the 11th –13 th of January 2005, hosted by ACET Uganda to celebrate 15 years of AIDS care and prevention, and 5 years as an independent nationally run organisation. The event attracted 140 delegates from 27 countries in Africa , Asia , Europe and America . The span of participants included development workers, policy makers, church leaders and Christian ministry workers. The overall impression expressed by the delegates revealed a high sense of spiritual motivation, practical insights gained from the interactions, and a recommitment to do all that they can within their means and resources.

The Conference, was in part, co-sponsored by the Imperial Group of Hotels. Financial support for the conference came primarily from Tearfund UK (who sponsored the Africa delegates), Samaritan's Purse (translation equipment and administration costs), ACET International Alliance ( Eastern Europe and Uganda delegates), UNAIDS who sponsored several participants from African nations and the Friends of ACET Uganda. The Friends of ACET Uganda, based in England , paid for themselves and contributed towards Conference Administration fees.

Theme:

The theme of the Conference was… “ A consolidated Christian response, taking stock, how far are we?” . The theme was designed to help the delegates focus of the Christian response to the pandemic, and to assess whether it was sufficient or not, and what strategies to emphasize in the future.

•  Conference Structure and Layout

The proceedings were in both English and French with translation also into Russian, Czech and Ukrainian. The conference was structured in such a manner to facilitate as much learning as possible. There were four ‘tracks' pursued;

• Exposure/Learning visits;
• Strategy Group Meetings
• Main Conference and
• Africa Partners Conference

a. Exposure and Learning Visits :

A series of exposure /learning visits were organized for delegates starting Sunday 10 th January 2005 . These were arranged according to certain themes.They involved projects to community and urban projects, care and preventions, church models for good practice and so on.

b. Strategy Groups : (Think Tank)

The HIV epidemic is dynamic. There are a lot of issues that come up that change rather rapidly. In regard to that, there is an ever growing need for strategy, focusing and effective targeting. The think tanks were designed to explore the future trends of the epidemic and consider what the most important/viable action for the church and other faith-based groups should be. Three forums were created for discussion groups:-

•  International Strategy (for organisations that had an International scope of influence),

•  National, local strategy (for organisations that predominantly has an in-country focus), and

•  Grassroots level strategy issues (for a more detailed project level focus/emphasis).

c. Main Conference

The main Conference was designed to take stock of where the church has come from and challenges for the future. The aim of this was to ensure that the church, as a whole, develops targeted interventions and to ensure that the work we do bears fruit. It was designed also to challenge many with new areas of intervention and ministry opportunities. This was done through a variety of ways.

c.1. Plenary Sessions

The plenary sessions were held after the morning devotion. These were structured to be motivational. Delegates appreciated these times. A wide range of topics were selected and very well presented in the course of the conference. The main conference theme was presented by Dr. Peter Okaalet on Tuesday morning. It was revealed the magnitude of work that had been done by the church and FBOs in general, however, it also left the glaring challenge that a lot more needed to be done if the impact of the church was to be distinctively noticeable. Other plenary speakers included Dr Patrick Dixon , founder of ACET; Renown Advocate Canon Gideon Byamugisha from Uganda ; Calle Almedal from UNAIDS Geneva ; George Verwer of Operation Mobilisation and David Kabiswa, Directors ACET Uganda

c.2. Poster Sessions

All conference participants were asked to prepare a poster reflecting the work that they do. To facilitate this a team of people from “Friends of ACET Uganda” formed a secretariat that provided these services. Many of these posters were put up in a room dedicated entirely for this. Delegates walked around during coffee breaks and held discussions.

c.3. Break-Out Seminars

The conference had break-out seminar sessions organized every afternoon. These too followed a selected thematic emphasis for each day (Appreciating the challenge, Inspiring Church Response and Models for the Way ahead. The detailed sessions presentations were selected to for the content that they had to share. It was designed that they would reflect models that could be emulated by others. These attempted to have a geographical representation from the 3 continents and to factor the Francophone-Anglophone aspects as well.

c.4. Informal networking:

There were 2 hours each evening, before supper, in which delegates were able to talk and network. From the look of things, one got the impression that a number of people were actually able to make vital connections.

c.5. Evening Worship

The evening worship focused on meeting the needs of selected partners. The worship team that led for the week was the Anglican Youth Fellowship (AYF) Band working closely with the Conference Worship committee.

The conference ended with a commissioning service. Delegates took time to reflect on the events of the 3 days and to make commitments as to what they would want to do differently

d. Africa Partners Conference

There was a one-day workshop for Africa partners to galvanise key learning from the conference with particular reference to the Strategy groups.

All the four core events took place as planned with the forth (Africa Partners Conference) being modified to focus more on strategy that the initial planning of a workshop. The delegates preferred more time for learning visits. These were organized to take care of the additional demand.

•  ACET International Alliance (AIA) Meeting

A series of meetings were held between the ACET International Alliance members and partners. The group discussed ways to be more supportive to the wider family so that there is some uniform growth and degree of impact. ACET Uganda, by far seemed the most supported. Following the difficult period it went through at the time of transition (2000-2005), it seemed to have got a lot of commitment for support than others in the Alliance .

During the week, there was discussion about the formation of another support group “Friends of ACET Eastern Europe”. The group would be coordinated by Simon Blanchflower and would seek to see the growing HIV/AIDS work supported and nurtured. There was need to look at the UK ACET family for similar structures to be developed ( Jersey and Newcastle ).

AIA Strategic Direction:

There was discussion about the future of the Alliance . The theme ran through the conference. Is the Alliance to become more than what it currently is or not? A number of people, both from within ACET and from without, attempted to answer this question. Arguments ranged from ACET being a "brand", a reassuring badge of quality that others wanted to belong to; the possibility of an ACET Africa were tabled on the one hand, while on the other, the limitations of trying to structure a people movement were highlighted and the administrative and structural challenges of an ACET Africa also highlighted.

The conclusion was that there is need to explore this question further with the support of some organisation development experts.

•  Outcomes:

The conference was inspiring and spiritually refreshing. Many people went away with renewed faith, sense of purpose and clarity about direction. HIV/AIDS was discussed concretely within the context of our core spiritual beliefs.

Fellowship and Support:

Delegate selection was guided by what each partner was doing in the area of HIV and AIDS. The responses from the people show that both mutual fellowship and support were achieved and shall hopefully continue in the future.

Connections:

A number of people were able to make vital connections. The event brought together donors and practitioners, policy makers and programme leaders. There was a lot of cross fertilisation of ideas.

.. “I have made some connection for the network in Burundi , I feel that now we shall be able to move forward a lot faster”…

.. I was able to talk a representative from Geneva Global, I understand what the want and I am going to give it a try”..

..” I was able to talk to my donor in a non threatening environment and agree on a number of things and ways to strengthen/clarify our partnership”..

•  Deliverables

1. Workshop CD:

Each workshop participant was given a CD at the end of the workshop that captured most of the presentations. In addition, there were notes that had been collected by rapporteurs in the break away meetings. Most of these resources are available in the resource area of this website.

2. Workshop Report

A detailed workshop report covering all the learning was circulated to the participants. This shall contain proposal for future action, such as the documentation of good practice.

•  Conclusions

a. International Strategy

The discussions in the conference brought out a wide range of issues that are affecting the current international strategy – both the concept and the practicalities of it. A number of organisations have bottlenecks – ranging from isolation, to the unavailability of resource persons to give them support. Other challenges and issues included unavailability of funding for some of the inter-country and wide ranging initiatives. The meeting was unable to reach an all-inclusive conclusion on the way forward.

b. Networking Versus Alliances:

There was a lot of discussion and some level of debate about the usefulness of networks. There seemed a strong opinion that networks were not effective in delivering and scaling up response. A few preferred the use of the word Alliance instead. At the end, there was agreement that people were not absolutely clear about the scope of the terminology “Network” PACANet (Pan African Christian AIDS Network, showed that it has mobilised cross border funding for members through the network – using a consortium approach. The use of terminology should NOT be the focus, rather there is a strong need to always offer explanation and not let the term used speak for itself to avoid the complication that come with the many interpretations for each terminology.

c. Expansion of the Alliance Membership;

There were a number of organisations that seemed keen to joining the alliance since invitation was given. No formal position was given as to whether or not they would join. There are various categories and it appeared that the priority would be laid on organisations that had the ability and capacity to be ‘resource providers'.

d. Development of UNAIDS Material: A guide to Working with FBOs

In the course of the Conference, it was revealed that a guide on working with the FBOs was to be developed in the near future. Patrick Dixon will work with Calle of UNAIDS and others to ensure this is in place.

e. Learning Visits;

There was a lot of learning that took place in the learning visits organized. A number of people made mention of how useful these had been and were considering whether these could be extended at later dates (future, medium term) for others.

•  Recommendations and Way Forward

1. Strategic Planning and Thinking Process for ACET International Alliance

ACET International Alliance needs to look for Organisation Development support so as to know which way to best structure itself to galvanise the work it is doing. This point is to be taken up by the ACET International Alliance secretariat at their next meeting and follow-up communication.

2. International Strategy

There is need to take further the dialogue that was started in the International Strategy group. Options for this shall include think tanks discussions by email with some of the group members. A paper highlighting these issues shall be tabled for discussion by the chief rapporteur.

3. Prayer Support

As a follow up to the conference, ACET (U) has as a component of its way forward, a plan to pray for those that attended in its weekly devotions.

4. Another Conference?

There was no conclusion to this question. A few members of the ACET international Alliance saw it repeated in Eastern Europe in the next 2-4 years. It is an issue to commit to prayer.

•  Conclusion:

The role of the Church is vital. This is evidenced in both the community responses as well as many of the Donors strategy choices of how to get to the grassroot communities and households. The role of the church could be further strength hence by coalitions, alliances and scaling up of good practices. This was well articulated. The mechanism for doing this was not. Conference was a time of renewal for many. There was a sense of mission being reaffirmed and/or established in some people. There is need for the continued encouragement and reminding of people of commitments made so as to galvanise the FBO Christian work and witness.

The invaluable connections that were made need to be kept alive as we seek tominister the love of Christ in a world of HIV/AIDS.