Decades of technical assistance by the development community have yielded a plethora of software tools to strengthen the management of reproductive health (RH) supply chains. Unfortunately, the frequent absence of a common vision among the tools’ designers, coupled with only minimal levels of technical coordination, have led to confusion at country level, both with respect to the tools’ appropriateness and their compatibility.

To address this critical weakness and further realize Goal 2 of the Coalition's Strategic Plan, the Systems Strengthening Working Group is reviewing the availability and utility of supply chain management software tools. Managed jointly by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the review is being conducted by the Supply Chain Management Center, Robert H. Smith School of Business, University of Maryland. The review, whose terms of reference can be found here, has two broad objectives:

• To create a common framework for categorizing software solutions that address key functions of the supply chain
• To classify and review existing software solutions according to the framework

Software tools currently under review include Pipeline, three versions of Supply Chain Manager, Country Commodity Manager, Channel, Quantimed, mSupply, and the RHInterchange. Other analyses have been made of commercial off-the-shelf software.