Middle-Income Countries' Financing Facility
Closing the gap on global health inequity to ensure the survival and development of every child.
The Middle-Income Countries' Financing Facility (MFF) is a UNICEF financing mechanism designed to improve global health equity by supporting the procurement of essential health supplies by countries that often no longer receive donor support. Some of these countries have lagged in the introduction and scale-up of vaccines and other essential health supplies for children, leading to avoidable illness and deaths. The MFF addresses these barriers and inequities by leveraging UNICEF's procurement scale, access, market expertise and affordable pricing.
How it works
The MFF builds on the successful experience of the Vaccine Independence Initiative (VII) Revolving Fund to offer pre-financing and special contracting modalities to support access to essential health supplies specifically for middle-income countries. The MFF is designed to support, not replace, countries’ strategic procurement planning efforts. It provides a temporary financial cushion that complements established planning processes rather than displacing them. As a financing partner, Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance supports UNICEF’s deployment of the MFF within the scope of GAVI’s Middle-Income Countries Approach.
The MFF can help address the following issues:
Cash flow delays - Country pre-financing can accelerate the delivery of supplies by allowing payment upon delivery instead of in advance of order placement.
Advance payment - To accelerate the procurement of essential health supplies, the MFF addresses countries' inability to pay in advance due to national procurement law restrictions by waiving part or all the advance payment obligation based on a repayment commitment from a country at the time of delivery.
Market shaping - Combining demand and signaling long-term commitments by several middle-income countries can support negotiation to accelerate or guarantee availability of supplies, reduce lead times, and improve pricing.
Criteria for eligibility
Countries - A broad range of middle-income countries procuring commodities through UNICEF are eligible to access the MFF.
Commodities - The MFF may be leveraged for most of the essential health commodities accessible to middle-income countries via UNICEF procurement.
Pre-financing requirements - Countries applying for MFF support need to demonstrate that the funds required to pay for the requested supplies are available, albeit with delays.
For additional information and any questions, please contact: sd.pscfinancing@unicef.org