Call for Proposals: Women’s Economic Empowerment Projects from Civil Society Organizations – Libya

Deadline: 21-Jun-20

UN Women is seeking proposals for the Women’s Economic Empowerment Projects from Civil Society Organizations.

The call for proposal is for civil society organizations working on Women’s Economic Empowerment in Libya. Small grants are intended for small contributions to Civil Society Organizations (CSO) awarded exclusively to finance a limited range of activities to support the development or strengthening of a CSO’s institutional capacity.

The activities include introduction or improvement of organizational systems, tools and processes, training of workforce in technical and managerial skills and support with adequate equipment. Activities may also include the implementation of these lessons learnt through women’s economic empowerment projects.

UN Women is targeting CSOs aiming to strengthen women economic empowerment and development of the peace nexus in Libya, ultimately promoting women’s empowerment, leadership and resilience for long term stabilization in Libya.

This project will aim to strengthen economic recovery through strategic partnerships with local women’s organizations and CSOs. The programme will build the capacities and skills of local women CSOs in peacebuilding to ensure women in Libya have the skills to engage in recovery initiatives and participate in stabilization efforts. The programme will ensure that the programs are gender inclusive, and proactively anticipate and address the needs of women and girls.

The programme will support and enhance the capacity of local CSO to provide vocational training and education training that would prepare participants and facilitate access to jobs/self-employment, with the aim to scale up local business owners who participate.

The Programme will include capacity training supporting women CSOs in consolidating their institutional and organizational skills in conceptualizing, designing and implementing gender responsive and results oriented humanitarian projects. Following the capacity building, a series of small grants will be allocated to enable the CSOs to implement the training and respond to the specific needs in their communities to promote women economic empowerment. This will be implemented through UN Women to improve the lives of women and youth.

Funding Information

UN Women plans to award small grants to eligible Civil Society Organizations (CSO) in the range of USD 2,500 to USD 30,000.

Eligibility Criteria

The applicant may apply if it:

• is a registered CSO in operation for at least three years;
• is not on the Consolidated UN Security Council Sanctions List;
• is not being investigated for fraud, corruption, sexual abuse, sexual exploitation or other wrongdoing;
• has not had funding received from UN Women entirely or partly written off by UN Women;
• is not currently engaged as an Implementing Partner (IP) or Responsible Party (RP) for UN Women;
• has not been engaged as an IP/RP for UN Women at any time after 21 November 2019;
• is not a government entity;
• is not a UN organization;
• is not an established CSO with the capacity to be engaged as an IP/RP;
• has sufficient capacity to collaborate with various stakeholders;
• has sufficient financial stewardship, including having adequate financial policies and procedures in place to manage the small grant; and,
• past performance has been deemed satisfactory by UN Women (if it has received small grants previously or been engaged as an IP/RP before 21 November 2019).

Eligible Activities

The applicant may apply for a small grant to cover the following activities:

• introducing and improving organizational systems, tools, and processes;
• training of workforce in technical and managerial skills; and,
• supporting with equipment such as copiers, scanners, printers, laptops and computers as long as the cost of such equipment is limited to 30% of the proposed small grant budget or USD5,000, whichever is lower.

Limitations

UN Women’s small grants are limited to a maximum of USD 30,000 per CSO per 12-month period and a maximum USD 60,000 for the lifetime of the CSO. The calculation of the maximum grant amount includes all small grants awarded to the CSO from all UN Women Offices.

Review Criteria

The applicant must:

• propose eligible activities that develop or strengthen the institutional capacity of the applicant and are consistent with the relevant strategic plan;
• not propose to use the small grant to provide an activity/output on behalf of UN Women, civil construction work, engineering work, purchases of vehicles or other tangible or intangible property, except for copiers, scanners, printers, laptops, and computers;
• not propose to use more than 30% of the small grant or USD5000, whichever is lower, to purchase copiers, scanners, printers, laptops, and computers;
• propose a timeline that is no longer than a year and eligible activities that are feasible to accomplish within a year, including political, security, logistical considerations;
• not propose to cover its indirect costs/support costs with the small grant;
• not make a direct profit from the small grant;
• not propose to cover costs incurred or committed prior to a signed Small Grant Agreement;
• propose eligible activities sustainably supporting the applicant
• propose eligible activities where the applicant has the capacity to reach the target audience; and,
• propose a budget that is cost-effective given the eligible activities, the number of targeted beneficiaries, and the proposed location.

For more information, visit https://arabstates.unwomen.org/en/what-we-do/programme-implementation/women-economic-empowerment-from-civil-society-orgs-in-libya-cfp