Deadline: 6-Feb-23
The African Union Development Agency (AUDA-NEPAD) hereby, under the Skills Initiative for Africa (SIFA) Financial Cooperation (FC), funded by the Federal Republic of Germany and the European Union, is looking to support Innovative solutions in the field of Technical and Vocational Education and Training that will contribute to higher productivity, employability, and job promotion for African youth.
The overall objective of SIFA is to strengthen the occupational prospects of young people in Africa. During its pilot phase (2016-2025), the Programme finances skills development projects expected to contribute to employment-oriented skills development for young people in African countries.
As a Programme, SIFA is committed to achieving results in four different areas:
- Result I: Selected institutions have been capacitated to provide employment-oriented skills development.
- Result II: Access to employment-oriented skills development for young people is improved, in particular for women, students from low-income groups, refugees and migrants.
- Result III: Private sector contributes to improving skills development by participating in the design and delivery of employment-oriented skills development programmes.
- Result IV: Lessons learned and best practices are disseminated at the national, regional and continental levels.
Thematic Areas
- Theme 1: Digital Tools & Skills: Enhanced delivery of TVET via digital technologies and applications to enhance employability in the post COVID-19 era.
- Theme 2: Female Entrepreneurship and Employability: Enhanced employability and enterprise creation amongst women, youth, and vulnerable groups in TVET.
- Theme 3: Training Innovation in Informal Sectors: Innovate TVET to deliver training and skills in informal sectors and vulnerable groups.
Funding Information
- Theme 1: Digital Tools and Skills
- The amount requested should not be more than EUR 400,000 and not less than EUR 300,000, inclusive of Value Added Tax (VAT). The grant amount should not exceed 90% of the total project cost, and the total matching (counterpart) funding should equal 10% of the total cost. The full matching funding can be provided as an in-kind contribution.
- Theme 2: Female Entrepreneurship and Employability
- The amount requested should not be more than EUR 400,000 and not less than EUR 300,000, inclusive of Value Added Tax (VAT). The grant amount should not exceed 90% of the total project cost, and the total matching (counterpart) funding should equal 10% of the total cost. The full matching funding can be provided as an in-kind contribution.
- Theme 3: Training Innovation in Informal Sectors
- The amount requested should not be more than EUR 300,000 and not less than EUR 150,000, inclusive of Value Added Tax (VAT). The grant amount should not exceed 90% of the total project cost, and the total matching (counterpart) funding should equal 10% of the total cost. The full matching funding can be provided as an in-kind contribution.
- Duration: The duration of the SIFA FW3 market validation project is up to 18 months.
Type of Projects Expected
- SIFA FW3 grants are targeted to projects focused on market validation and user testing of the proposed innovative concept and/or prototype. Alternatively, the innovation proposed for FW3 funding can be based on an already existing, well-functioning product/service/process sought to be replicated in a new market and/or another SIFA country.
- For early-stage projects, the product/service/process model should at least exist as a concept or prototype and be ready to be validated in a real-life environment with users (proof-of-concept). If the project entails a mature service seeking validation in new markets, the intended market(s) should be in one of the SIFA partner countries.
- Note: SIFA FW3 grant awarding authority (AUDA/NEPAD) does not take any equity on either the products/services/concepts or the organisations supported.
- The FW3 proposal should therefore include the following components:
Eligibility Criteria
- SIFA FW3 funding is available to organisations from the public and private sectors and civil society. Applicants must be enterprises, public bodies or non-profit organisations, i.e., they must be socalled legal persons.
- NB: Individual persons are not eligible to apply for a SIFA FW3 grant.
- Due to the FW3 emphasis on cross-border collaboration, replication of good practice and exchange of knowledge within and across ecosystems is encouraged. Proposals can arrive from a combination or a group of organisations formed to undertake the implementation of the proposed project in more than one SIFA partner country. The scale of projects supported may very well normally exceed the resources of any one member of such groups, and hence the FW3 grant is applied.
- To SIFA FW3, such group undertakings are defined as the Project Partnership, which comprises an association of two or more entities (companies, organisations or public authorities) with the objective of participating in a common activity and/or pooling their resources to achieve a common goal through a project supported by the FW3 grant. The Project Coordinator (Lead Partner) leads the Partnership and has the responsibility to keep all parties informed of the progress and undertakings throughout the application process. Prior to any commitment to submit a proposal to the SIFA FW3 CfPs, the Partnership must discuss, decide, identify, and commit to their respective roles in the project; they should realistically estimate resources such as personnel and finance and define a realistic ‘business’ target that addresses a real need. Once consensus has been reached on these matters, the proposal is drafted and circulated to all partners until a final version is agreed on. All partners must be equally committed to the submission of an application and to the participation in the project. The Lead Partner will submit the proposal on behalf of the Partnership.
Project Partnership
- For each Project Partnership that applies for FW3, funding should fulfil the following minimum requirements:
- It must consist of at least two impartial, registered legal entities from one SIFA partner country (Cameroon, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Togo and Tunisia). One must be the Lead Partner.
- The Project Lead Partner (Grantee) must be a registered legal entity from a SIFA partner country.
- Project activities are to be implemented in a minimum of one SIFA partner country.
- Participation from outside a SIFA partner country: SIFA FW3 allows the participation of entities from countries outside of the eight SIFA partner countries in projects where such participation is of mutual interest and ensures the interoperability of products, services and applications.
For more information, visit SIFA.