EU announces CFPs to Promote Sustainable Fisheries in the Eastern Africa, Southern Africa and Indian Ocean Region

Deadline: 31 July 2019

The European Union (EU) is seeking proposals for its grant program entitled “Supporting fisheries management and governance initiatives in small-scale inland and marine fisheries in the Eastern Africa, Southern Africa and Indian Ocean region”.

The programme’s overall objective is to enhance equitable economic growth by promoting sustainable fisheries in the EA-SA-IO region. The specific objective is to support sustainable management and development of fisheries in order to contribute to poverty alleviation, food and nutrition security, while addressing climate change resilience and enhancing marine biodiversity.

Result Areas

The programme has three result areas as follows:

Result 1: Regional policies and institutional frameworks are enhanced to secure more sustainable fisheries management and contribute to marine biodiversity and climate resilience;
Result 2: Strengthened capacity to prevent, deter and eliminate Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing in the EA-SA-IO region; and
Result 3: Concrete fisheries management and governance initiatives in small-scale inland and marine fisheries are supported with the possibilities of replication at regional level.

The present Call for Proposals will address Result 3 of the E€OFISH programme. It aims at providing support to small-scale fisheries communities to allow them to actively participate in the management and development of the fisheries sector in a bid to address the marginalisation of small-scale fisheries (SSF). Small-scale fisheries are highly important as a backbone of livelihoods in rural coastal communities.

Objectives

The specific objectives of this call for proposals are to:

Promote sustainable management of small scale fisheries;
Increase the contribution of small scale fisheries to sustainable growth;
Contribute to the equitable development of small-scale fishing communities.

Priorities Area

The priorities of this call for proposals are:

Clearly demonstrate how small-scale fisheries can contribute to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) paying particular attention to the following ones – SDG#1: End poverty in all its forms everywhere; SDG#2: End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture; SDG#5: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls; SDG#8: Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all; and SDG#14: Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development;
Promote a human rights-based approach, by empowering small-scale fishing communities, including both men and women to participate in decision-making processes, and to assume responsibilities for sustainable use of fishery resources, and placing emphasis for the benefit of vulnerable and marginalized groups;
Promote international standards on sustainable fisheries management and notably eradicate “destructive fishing practices” and the over-exploitation of specific fisheries;
Improve the transformation, transport, conservation, etc. conditions at the fishery level, in order to guarantee the fish quality for consumption and reduce fish waste and losses;
Promote multi-stakeholders approaches such as working with local authorities, public and/or private sector operators;
Focus on fisheries and value chains of regional interest (i.e. shared fisheries or fisheries present in different countries of the region).

Indicative Allocation of Funds by Lot

There will be three different lots; the indicative allocations per lot are as follows:

Lot 1: Actions in the Eastern Africa region
- Total available: EUR 3,000,000
Lot 2: Actions in the Southern Africa region
- Total available: EUR 3,000,000
Lot 3: Actions in the Indian Ocean region
- Total available: EUR 2,000,000

Size of Grants

Any grant requested under this call for proposals must fall between the following minimum and maximum amounts:

minimum amount: EUR 500 000
maximum amount: EUR 1 000 000

Eligibility Criteria

Lead Applicant
- In order to be eligible for a grant, the lead applicant must:
  - be a legal person and
  - be a specific type of organisation such as: non-governmental organisation, public sector operator (government bodies), local authority, a Non-State Actor (NSA), a business organisation (producer organisation, MSMEs, cooperatives and social enterprises), a research institute constituted in accordance with the legislation in force in the Member States of the five Duly Mandated Regional Organisations of the EA-SA-IO region, or an international (inter-governmental) organisation as defined by Article 43 of the rules of application of the EU Financial Regulation ; 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.
Potential applicants may not participate in calls for proposals or be awarded grants if they are in any of the situations.
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.
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 (granddaughter 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.