On April 5th 2012, the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation jointly made a commitment for 20 million euros, with each side providing half of that amount, to support family planning projects in West Africa. This agreement was announced on the occasion of the TEDxChange Event in Berlin (http://www.ted.com/pages/tedxchange_overview) where Melinda Gates made a presentation on the need to invest more in family planning.
Development Minister Niebel said: “Family planning is a decisive lever for bringing about a significant reduction of maternal and child mortality in developing countries. It thus also plays an important role for the achievement of further Millennium Development Goals, especially gender equality and the empowerment of women. The BMZ has adopted an Initiative on Rights-based Family Planning and Maternal Health, thus setting clear priorities, and it has more than doubled its bilateral commitments in 2011 over 2008 levels, bringing the total to nearly 100 million euros.”