Scaling up the WARMI Project: lessons learned mobilizing Bolivian communities around reproductive health.

This paper describes eight major steps in the process of scaling up from the experience of SFC/ Bolivia. From 1995 through 1997 SCF/Bolivia working with the Ministry of Health PROCOSI (a national PVO umbrella group) and other partners expanded the Warmi Project from a pilot in three rural communities in one province to a national program affecting 513 communities in Bolivia. Their experience demonstrates how participatory approaches specifically the community action cycle can be brought to national scale through flexibility inter-institutional coordination and establishment of common goals. As the Warmi model expands to other countries in Latin America and Africa health planners need to examine lessons learned from this seminal work in Bolivia. (authors)