On 29 September 2026, the Ifakara Health Institute (IHI) joined youth organisations, government institutions, NGOs, development partners and young people in Dar es Salaam at the National Adolescent and Youth Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (AYSRHR) Forum, bringing stakeholders together to discuss priorities for improving health services and outcomes for adolescents and young people in Tanzania.

The forum provided a platform to examine how health systems can become more responsive to the needs and experiences of young people, with discussions focusing on service integration, inclusion of adolescents with disabilities, and strengthening the quality and responsiveness of adolescent-friendly health services.

Putting quality at the centre of adolescent-friendly services

A key area of discussion was the use of WHO standards and quality-assessment approaches for adolescent-friendly health services. These tools provide a framework for assessing services across areas including accessibility, equity, acceptability, appropriateness and effectiveness, while also considering the meaningful participation of adolescents and young people.

Participants highlighted the importance of adapting these approaches to the Tanzanian context and ensuring that young people themselves are actively involved in assessing and improving the services designed for them.

Representing IHI during the opening session, Principal Scientist Dr Sally Mtenga underscored the need to address young people's mental health alongside their sexual and reproductive health needs.

She also emphasised the importance of ensuring that adolescents can access respectful, safe and responsive sexual and reproductive health services, particularly services that recognise their diverse needs and experiences.

“Young people need services that respond to their realities, respect their voices and create an environment where they can seek care safely and confidently.”

Putting young people at the centre

The forum reinforced a central message: adolescents and young people must be at the centre of SRHR programmes.

This means going beyond designing services for young people to meaningfully involving them in decisions about the services they use, from design and implementation to monitoring and continuous improvement.

For IHI, the discussions highlighted the continued importance of evidence, inclusion and youth participation in strengthening health systems and developing services that enable adolescents and young people to thrive.