Effective at the regional level.

PIP: The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) evaluated the regional project, Family Planning and IEC for Adolescents (RLA/92/P01) in Latin America, which it funds, and found it to be "effective and extremely necessary in the region." It was recommended that the strategy employed (a regional network through the American Conferences on Integrated Programs) by JOICFP, and the methodology used for IEC training in regional workshops on adolescents and IEC materials be continued and strengthened in the new regional project. The evaluation was conducted around San Lucas Toliman, Solola, Guatemala, during August 14-23 by Isabel Hernandez (advisor on sociocultural research, Country Support Team for Latin America and the Caribbean, UNFPA), Surama Lima de Juarez (national consultant on reproductive health, Nursery School of Quetzaltenango, Guatemala), Mirtha Carrera Halim (country director-UNFPA, Honduras and Guatemala), and Sergio de Leon (program officer-UNFPA, Guatemala). At the local level, although the Integrated Project (IP) had responded to many of the needs of the population, the following areas were not fully addressed: 1) health attention; 2) reproductive health; 3) IEC, particularly for adolescents; 4) nutrition; 5) sanitation; and 6) micromanagement. Obstacles to project promotion include: 1) interethnic relations based on indigenous prejudice which hamper community participation; and 2) the low status of women. The evaluation team recommended that research be conducted on ethnic consciousness in the indigenous population of Solola to define more effective strategies, and that a campaign be started against ethnic prejudice. Mechanisms of community intervention based on the findings of the studies could be used to raise the status of women.^ieng