French Embassy in Cameroon launches Call for Proposals for PISCCA 2020

Deadline: 8 March 2020

The French Embassy in Cameroon has launched a call for proposals for “Innovative Projects from Civil Societies and Coalitions of Actors (PISCCA) 2020”, to support innovations of Cameroonian youth and civil society for citizen participation and environmental protection.

The French Embassy in Cameroon has been supporting Cameroonian civil society for several years. Between 2005 and 2016, more than 30 projects led by civil society organizations (CSOs) were funded by various programs for a total amount of more than one billion FCFA.

This program Civil Society Projects and Coalitions of Actors (PISCCA) continues this action. It becomes the main support tool for Cameroonian civil society and youth carried by the French Embassy. In 2019, it helped support the projects of seven Cameroonian CSOs across Cameroon.

The SCSAP is intended for Cameroonian CSOs: association, common interest groups, network associations, and non-governmental organizations.

It is aimed at favour, in a transversal way, the structuration and professionalization of civil society organizations. Its objectives are to foster sustainable development projects, to promote innovative initiatives promoted by the civil society, to build the capacities of the beneficiaries of the projects and the CSOs, to encourage the networking and synergy between the civil society actors, to favour the emergence of new actors in the public debate, and to increase their credibility as development actors.

Themes

The project proposed has to be in accordance with one or more of the following themes:

• Citizenship and peace building
  • Citizen participation and follow up of public policies;
    • Building on the momentum of the February 9th local elections and the enforcement/applicability of the decentralization law, projects promoting citizen engagement in local affairs, especially the youth: enabling participative structures, engaging in joint design or assessment of local public policies, accountability of elected representatives.
  • Citizen participation in the responses designed to address the crisis in the Septentrion and the North-West South-West regions;
    • Within the regions impacted by forced population displacements, projects aimed at furthering peace: integration of displaced individuals, promoting the culture of peace on the social media or through visual arts (documentaries, performances).
• Environment and biodiversity preservation
  • Conservation of threatened wildlife species and integration of indigenous living in or nearby Protected Areas;
    • Projects aimed at preserving or reestablishing to a suitable state of conservation of endangered species of wild fauna and flora or, furthering the integration of indigenous living in or nearby Protected Areas will be favored
  • Environmental awareness in urban and peri-urban areas and green education actions
    • Projects aimed at improving the ownership/appropriation of sustainable development issues by technical audiences and to a more lay public such as the youth in a scholastic framework will be favored.

Two transversal themes will systematically be taken into account:

• Inclusion and capacity building of the Cameroonian Youth;
• The impact of the project in terms of socio-economic insertion of young girls, gender equality promotion and fight against gender based violence.

Geographical Priorities

The funded activities can be implemented all over the country, no project will be excluded on a geographical basis. However, two priority areas will be given particular attention:

• The North: the projects aimed at fostering the development in the Adamawa, North and Far North regions, due to the fact that those regions record the lowest socioeconomic indicators in the country.
• The Anglophone regions: Project that contribute to dialog and restoration of peace in the Northwest and Southwest regions, or in the Anglophones communities living in francophone areas.

Funding Information

• The required financing shall range between €10 000 (FCFA 6 559 558) and €40 000 (FCFA 26 238 234) and amount to a minimum of 90% of the total coast of the project;
• In case the project is submitted by several CSO (that might include a CSO leader) the financing can reach €60 000 (39 537 420 FCFA).
• A minimum of 10% of the total amount shall be provided in co-funding by the selected CSO or a financial partner (private or public);

Eligibility Criteria

• The project must be promoted by a Cameroonian CSO (association, common interest groups, network associations, non-governmental organizations), which has been legally established for at least two years (before the 1st of January 2018).
• Microfinance companies are not eligible for this call for proposals.

• Real estate purchase and construction projects (school, health care facilities etc.)
• Functioning or equipment of administrative services, associations or private projects, when the funding of such operations is not part of a real development project (rental, purchase or maintenance of vehicles, wages, expenses, electricity etc.)

• Projects on local development offering an innovative approach that has the potential to be replicate at a larger scale;
• Projects that are generated by, or contribute to the structuration of a civil society actors network;
• Projects carried out in partnership with local authorities, (local governments traditional authorities…)
• Project aimed at complementing actions lead by other technical and financial partners
• Project which gather several CSO around a thematic or a territory
• Project which favor the integration of French volunteers (“France Volontaires” platform).

How to Apply

The application shall be sent in digital format at the address given on the website.

• The results will be communicated by email. Only the preselected CSOs will be notified.
  • April 2020 : Final selection committee.
  • April 2020 : training session in Yaoundé and official quick off meeting.
• The list of selected projects will be publically released subsequently.

For more information, visit https://cm.ambafrance.org/Call-for-proposals-2020-Innovative-Projects-from-Civil-Societies-and-Coalitions