Funded by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), SOHIP aims to strengthen systems for improved health care service provision in the context of devolution. The four-year project will work to improve the ability of health services to be more gender-sensitive and pro-poor, through a dual focus on health promotion and on management and accountability in the health system. The formal outcome result statement for SOHIP is to help produce strengthened management and accountability systems for effective delivery of gender-sensitive, pro-poor health services integrating prevention and health promotion in Punjab province, as demonstrated in selected districts.

SOHIP is a capacity development project: it aims to build the knowledge, skills and capacity of service providers and managers in its areas of focus, and to develop tools, processes, policies and systems that enable people to exercise their improved capacity in their daily work. The project is not directly involved in service delivery or infrastructure improvements at health care facilities, though limited infrastructure support is being planned for key training and capacity development institutions.