European Union Supporting Core Functions of Human Rights-based CSOs

Deadline: 28-May-21

European Union is pleased to launch a call for proposals to support Core Functions of CSOs “to contribute to strengthening participatory democracy by improving the resilience of rights-based civil society organisations and grassroot organisations in Turkey“.

The call aims to support core functions of rights-based civil society organisations — including those active in the field of human rights promotion and protection- combining financial support with capacity-building.

Objectives

The specific objectives of this call for proposals are:

To support human rights civil society organisations and grass root organisations to secure their functioning (lot 1): The beneficiary is expected to provide financial support to third parties and capacity-building to allow organisations to operate independently and to sustain their operations while being organisationally and institutionally strengthened.
To increase the capacity of civil society organisations (lot 2): The beneficiary is expected to combine a long-term comprehensive package of capacity building with financial support to third parties to enhance the organisational strength of rights-based civil society organisations.

Priorities

The priorities of this call are:

Use of a Rights-based Approach (RBA): A rights-based organisation is understood as an organisation that respects the rights-based approach (RBA). The five RBA working principles: applying all rights; participation and access to decision-making process; non-discrimination and equal access; accountability and access to rule of law; transparency and access to information should be implemented as appropriate in relation to any proposed project, in each step of the project cycle from identification, formulation, implementation, monitoring to evaluation.

Gender mainstreaming and use of sex-disaggregated indicators mentioned in the EU Gender Action Plan 2016-2020: Gender equality is an integral part of the RBA, encompassing the promotion, protection and fulfilment of all human rights. Gender equality constitutes a fundamental human rights principle and a common value of the European Union (EU Treaties, EU Gender Action Plan 2016-2020).

Use of innovative tools to support CSOs and evidence of complementarity with actions undertaken through other EU-funded programmes will be considered as an added-value.

Priority for lot 1 will be given to actions including support to CSOs working on rights of persons belonging to minorities and on non-discrimination.

Funding Information

The overall indicative amount made available under this call for proposals is BUR 7,000,000. The contracting authority reserves the right not to award all available funds. Indicative allocation of funds by lot/geographical distribution:

Support to human rights CSOs and grass root organisations to secure their functioning EUR 3,000,000;

Structured capacity-building of CSOs EUR 4,000,000.

Eligibility Criteria

Lead applicant(s)

In order to be eligible for a grant, the lead applicant must:

Be a legal person; and
Be non-profit-making; and
Be a civil society organisation; and
Be established in a Member State of the European Union or a Beneficiary of the IPA II or a member state of the European Economic Area (EEA) country; and
Be directly responsible for the preparation and management of the action with the co-applicant(s) and affiliated entity(ies), not acting as an intermediary.

Co-applicant(s)

Co-applicants participate in designing and implementing the action, and the costs they incur are eligible in the same way as those incurred by the lead applicant.
Co-applicants must satisfy the eligibility criteria as applicable to the lead applicant himself.
Co-applicants must sign the mandate form.

Affiliated Entity(ies)

The lead applicant and its co-applicant(s) may act with affiliated entity(ies).
Only the following entities may be considered as affiliated entities to the lead applicant and/or to co-applicant(s):
- Only entities having a structural link with the applicants (i.e. the lead applicant or a co-applicant), in particular a legal or capital link.
- This structural link encompasses mainly two notions:
  - Control, as defined in Directive 2013/34/EU on the annual financial statements, consolidated financial statements and related reports of certain types of undertakings:
    - Entities affiliated to an applicant may hence be:
      - Entities directly or indirectly controlled by the applicant (daughter companies or first-tier subsidiaries). They may also be entities controlled by an entity controlled by the applicant (grandrlanghter companies or second-tier subsidiaries) and the same applies to further tiers of control;
      - Entities directly or indirectly controlling the applicant (parent companies). Likewise, they may be entities controlling an entity controlling the applicant;
      - Entities under the same direct or indirect control as the applicant (sister companies).
  - Membership, i.e. the applicant is legally defined as a e.g. network, federation, association in which the proposed affiliated entities also participate or the applicant participates in the same entity (e.g. network, federation, association,…) as the proposed affiliated entities.