The Quito Project--A New Model, A New Approach

For the past four years, The Quito Project (TQP) has been implementing multidisciplinary interventions for advancing the development of impoverished communities in Quito, Ecuador. We've approached the community as an independent non-governmental organization (NGO) in partnership with an Ecuadorian NGO, and offered the best that NGOs have to offer in development assistance: closeness to the community, freedom to innovate, ability to build strong trust and rapport with the community, and a short supply chain. Recent improvements in government provision of health care services in Quito, however, have drawn our attention to the advantages that government has to offer in health sector development: potential for scale-up, sustainable funding, harmonization of development efforts, and access to legislative privileges.

Therefore, TQP has begun working with the Ecuadorian Ministry of Public Health at the local level to create a new development strategy for health and social services in Quito. As an NGO, TQP can offer our innovative model of integrating health, social, and education services into a "package," our knowledge of community-level implementation, and the opportunity for partnerships with U.S. universities and their tremendous intellectual capital. Working with the Ministry of Public Health at the local level in Quito, we hope to polish and perfect TQP's integrated model so it can be replicated and feasibly brought to scale in years to come.

Governments and NGOs have been working independently for decades to improve the lives of the most vulnerable populations. TQP strives to actualize an effective public-private collaboration with the Ecuadorian Ministry of Public Health to create sustainable solutions to poverty – now and for years to come.