UNFPA is committed to achieving three transformative and peoplecentred results by the year 2030: to end preventable maternal deaths, to end the unmet need for family planning, and to end gender-based violence and harmful practices. The UNFPA transformative results are closely aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly SDGs 3 and 5 (Good Health and Well-being; and Gender Equality), as well as with the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) Programme of Action.

The ICPD held in Cairo in 1994 and subsequent global commitments and conventions have highlighted universal access to sexual and reproductive health care as being core to the realization of sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) and called for universal access to SRHR as part of universal health coverage. Equity in access, quality of care and accountability, are key to advancing the UNFPA transformative results and the Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights aspects of the Agenda 2030. Sexual and reproductive health services are of good quality when services are delivered in a safe, effective, timely, efficient, integrated, equitable and people-centred manner; when they are based on care standards and treatment guidelines; and when necessary and quality commodities are available and take people’s experiences and perceptions of care into account, including affordability and acceptability.

An adequate and reliable supply of sexual and reproductive health commodities plays a key role in advancing sexual and reproductive health and rights. Without essential SRH commodities, women are more vulnerable to poor sexual and reproductive health outcomes such as sexually transmitted infections, including HIV/AIDS, unplanned pregnancies, and unsafe abortion. The risk of complications, as well as maternal and newborn mortality and morbidity, is also heightened without the basic medical supplies and equipment for pregnancy and safe delivery.

Reproductive Health Commodity Security (RHCS) means all individuals have access to affordable, quality sexual and reproductive health supplies of their choice whenever they need them. In other words, RHCS is about making sure no one leaves a clinic empty-handed. This is why UNFPA characterizes RHCS as having the right quantities of the right products in the right condition in the right place at the right time for the right price and works to ensure that each of these elements is met.

As the sexual and reproductive health agency of the United Nations, UNFPA takes a leading role in RHCS. This role includes carrying out assessments, such as this one, to evaluate the RHCS maturity and identify strengths and weaknesses at the national and/or regional levels to inform future programming. Achieving RHCS is critical to improving maternal health and saving lives. It also enables couples and individuals to exercise their right to have children by choice, not chance. Furthermore, RHCS is an important part of UNFPA’s mandate and plays a key role in fulfilling our mission to deliver a world where every pregnancy is wanted, every childbirth is safe, and every young person’s potential is fulfilled.