ISSUP National Chapters on the way

In addition to ISSUP's digital presence and annual event, ISSUP is now focused on building its third major strand. The third dimension is the establishment of ISSUP National Chapters. This will allow ISSUP’s activities and contributions to be available to meet the national needs and promote national and international sharing and support. ISSUP Kenya, Pakistan and Philippines are already in existence, but the new focus will allow their operations to be brought within a shared expression of ISSUP activity as well as establishing functioning ISSUP Nationals in new countries. The ISSUP mission and its principles of operation will be the key shared dimension for ISSUP’s work at both the national and international levels.

The 3rd ISSUP Workshop in Cancun, Mexico allowed ISSUP to hold meetings for creating National Chapters in Brazil, Chile, India, Kenya, Malaysia, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines, South Africa and the United Arab Emirates. Representatives from all 10 countries signed a ‘declaration of intent’ to become a National Chapter in the months ahead. Within the next 10 months the focus will be to refine the existing National Chapter activity in Kenya, Pakistan and the Philippines, and to establish new Chapters in Brazil, Malaysia, South Africa and the United Arab Emirates. The challenge will then be to work with Chile, India and Nigeria along with other prospective countries to establish new ISSUP National Chapters in 2019.

The work will be undertaken through ISSUP’s National Chapter Coordinator and Senior Consultant. They will work with the host organisation in each country that seeks to obtain ISSUP National Chapter status. The host organisations will link with ISSUP to establish a Memorandum of Understanding for their operation as ISSUP within the national context. The National Chapters will operate with shared principles and will share the vision of building a professional substance use prevention and treatment workforce undertaking evidence-based, high quality and ethical work supported by Global ISSUP under one website.

Any organisation wishing to be considered as a host for ISSUP’s activity at the national level and wishing to achieve the status of an ISSUP National Chapter should share their interest with ISSUP’s National Chapter Coordinator: triva [dot] setiawan [at] issup [dot] net (riva[dot]setiawan[at]issup[dot]net) The process for becoming a National Chapter is significant and will require communication, negotiation and agreement as to the roles and responsibilities of any prospective national partner. ISSUP seeks to have 25 National Chapters in operation by the end of 2020 subject to receiving the resources required to reach this target.

Jeff Lee

ISSUP Senior Consultant