Deadline: 13 April 2020
The U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Population Refugees and Migration (PRM) has announced a 2020 Notice of Funding Opportunity for NGO programs benefiting refugees and asylum seekers in Thailand, Nepal, India, and Bangladesh.
Proposed activities should primarily support refugees and asylum seekers in Thailand, Nepal, India, and Bangladesh. Because of PRM’s mandate to provide protection, assistance, and sustainable solutions for refugees and victims of conflict, PRM will consider funding only those programs that include a target beneficiary base of at least 50 percent refugees/IDPs/other populations of concern.
Program Areas
Proposals must support one or more of the following program areas:
- Humanitarian Protection and Assistance
- Interim and Durable Solutions
Country-Specific Provisions
Thailand
- General Guidance: PRM welcomes submissions from both international and national NGOs serving the urban refugee and asylum seeker population in and around Bangkok. PRM strongly encourages partnerships with women-led organizations when possible.
- Sectors: Protection (including Case Management, and Emergency and Legal Assistance), Child Protection, GBV prevention and response, Education, Health, Mental Health and Psychosocial Support, and Livelihoods. Specifically, PRM welcomes submissions that:
- Improve access to primary healthcare, including reproductive health, medical services, mental health, and/or psychosocial support to vulnerable urban refugee and asylum seeker populations in Bangkok, including facilitating access to public clinics and hospitals and advocating for greater Royal Thai Government provision of such services directly.
- Provision of case management, implemented by well trained staff with appropriate supervision that addresses protection needs and other vulnerabilities through direct support and/or referrals, including emergency assistance, access to quality education and other community services, and limited financial assistance. Submissions should describe how such activities will help the Royal Thai Government build its own capacity to conduct such case management in the future.
- Improve access to immediate and long-term protection mechanisms and services, including legal assistance and representation services for vulnerable urban refugee and asylum seeker populations in Bangkok.
- Build capacities of urban refugees and asylum seekers to support their communities and meet needs, for example through the provision of interpreter training, development of refugee-led empowerment groups, community responses to GBV issues, and increased access to livelihoods.
- Duration of Activity: Program plans for 24 or 36 months will be considered.
- Funding Limits: Program proposals must not be less than $300,000 per year and not more than $500,000 per year or they will be disqualified.
- Total Anticipated Amount to be Awarded: PRM anticipates, but makes no guarantee, to fund up to one award up to $500,000 per year total through this NOFO for Thailand.
- General Guidance:
- Priority will be given to proposals that meet the critical needs of the Rohingya and Bangladeshi host populations, in line with the Bangladesh 2020 and subsequent Joint Response Plans (JRPs) for the Rohingya Humanitarian Crisis.
- PRM welcomes submissions from both international and national NGOs. PRM strongly encourages partnerships with women-led organizations when possible.
- Priority will be given to those NGOs registered by the Government of Bangladesh.
- Provision of core relief items, cash assistance, and/or capacity development activities will be considered if integrated in a program focused on one or more of the sectors.
- For livelihoods activities, PRM will prioritize impact-driven, market-based projects that seek to improve the economic well-being of beneficiaries. Wherever possible, projects should seek to restore or build upon former livelihoods activities of affected populations.
- Given the particular language challenges of the Rohingya response, projects in all sectors should briefly state their strategies for effective oral and written communication with beneficiaries and detail resources, staffing, and monitoring and evaluation to implement it.
- A working relationship with and/or current funding from UNHCR and/or IOM. If no previous relationship or funding, letters of support from both UNHCR and IOM for the proposed activities are required (this letter should highlight the gap in services the proposed program is designed to address).
- Sectors: Protection, GBV, Child Protection, Health, Nutrition, Food Security, WASH, Disaster Risk Reduction, Capacity Building. Priority activities within those sectors are suggested below.
- Health:
- Provide psycho social services and strengthen referral systems, particularly to provide protection to women and children, including to treat and prevent under nutrition; and/or
- Improve access to physical rehabilitation.
- Nutrition and Food Security:
- Improve identification, treatment, and prevention of under nutrition, including by strengthening health systems.
- Improve refugees’ dietary diversity, particularly access to fresh vegetables, with consideration to livelihood opportunities for refugees.
- Raise awareness of basic food hygiene and nutritional good practices.
- WASH:
- Strengthen and maintain facilities (for example, water points, washing blocks, latrines, and waste management sites) with consideration to livelihood opportunities for refugees.
- Improve inclusiveness of facilities, particularly for women and girls and persons with disabilities.
- Increase sustainability of facilities through community empowerment, such as through establishment or reactivation of water management committees; and/or
- Raise awareness of health and hygiene issues.
- Disaster Risk Reduction:
- Build capacities of Disaster Management Councils at various levels and develop risk mitigation schemes with consideration to livelihood opportunities for refugees.
- Capacity Building:
- Build capacities of local NGOs as partners and sub-implementers in the above sectors.
- Increase the capacity of target communities to identify and effectively respond to GBV through skills building, training, and coaching.
- Health:
- Duration of Activity: Program plans for 24 or 36 months will be considered.
- Funding Limits: Program proposals must not be less than $2,000,000 per year and not more than $7,500,000 per year or they will be disqualified.
- Total Anticipated Amount to be Awarded: PRM anticipates, but makes no guarantee, to fund as many as three awards, up to a per year total of $12,000,000, through this NOFO for Bangladesh.
Nepal and India
- General Guidance:
- PRM welcomes submissions from both international and national NGOs. PRM strongly encourages partnerships with women-led organizations when possible.
- PRM will accept no more than two application packages per applicant (one for Tibetan refugees in India and Nepal and one proposal for Rohingya refugees in India).
- NGO projects should seek to fill gaps in humanitarian assistance, not duplicate activities undertaken by large international organizations or government entities.
- PRM looks favorably on programs with the ability to operate in multiple locations and across multiple sectors, as articulated below, provided such work supports an integrated program approach.
- Applicants are strongly encouraged to engage with existing structures to provide services to refugees, including those operated by national or local actors (both governmental and NGO), rather than establishing new, parallel structures.
- TIBETANS in INDIA and NEPAL
- Sectors: Protection, Child Protection, GBV prevention and response, Health, Mental Health and Psychosocial Support, WASH, and Education. Priority activities within those sectors are suggested below.
- Protection (including GBV prevention and response and child protection):
- Provide protection services and/or referrals, such as legal assistance, to incoming refugees and asylum seekers in India and Nepal.
- Design and implement mechanisms to prevent and respond to gender-based violence (GBV) in communities and institutions. Improve knowledge of GBV risk-mitigation and promote positive changes in attitudes and behaviors within refugee communities through targeted and sustained engagement.
- Increase the capacity of target communities to identify and effectively respond to GBV through skills building, training, and coaching.
- Improve the capacity of service providers to provide timely, high-quality support, including for safety, justice and/or other services, as well as multi sectoral referral services.
- Improve the capacity of service providers to institute Protection against Sexual Exploitation and Abuse (PSEA) strategies and response activities, including training and mentoring on PSEA principles, risk identification and mitigation, instituting safe reporting mechanisms, providing assistance and/or referrals for SEA survivors, investigating and responding to SEA incidents, and mobilization of community and leadership.
- Health:
- Provide and/or improve access to primary healthcare, including reproductive health, mental health and psychosocial support, for the most vulnerable within Tibetan communities, particularly for the elderly, persons with disabilities and chronic conditions, survivors of GBV, and those in remote settlements.
- Address priority public health issues, including tuberculosis, reproductive health, including maternal health interventions, Hepatitis B, HIV/AIDS, and substance abuse.
- Assist Tibetan refugees to access and utilize the national health care systems such as through support for interpreters, facilitators, or cash or vouchers. Assist the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) and health care providers to coordinate with the national or local Indian and Nepali health systems to avoid duplicating services provided to Tibetans by national or local systems.
- Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH):
- Provide and/or improve access to WASH facilities in Tibetan refugee settlements, to include potable water, drainage; adequate, safe and sustainable toilet facilities, fecal sludge management including treatment, and bathing facilities. Priority will be given to activities in rural communities that engage with existing government schemes, rather than establishing new, parallel structures.
- PRM will prioritize WASH projects that bring Tibetan settlements into compliance with SPHERE standards. General maintenance of WASH facilities will not be considered.
- Education:
- Provide and/or improve access to quality primary, secondary, and non-formal education, including early childhood development, with priority given to projects focused on local options for vulnerable children within Tibetan communities. Post-secondary education assistance will not be considered.
- Prioritization:
- Evidence of participatory needs assessments involving beneficiaries.
- Evidence of coordination with international organizations (IOs) and other NGOs working in the same area or sector as well as local authorities, including Tibetan settlement officers and host government authorities, and in India, the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA).
- Complementarity activities with existing U.S. Government-funded development, protection, and assistance activities, including ongoing and planned USAID programs benefiting Tibetan refugees. Proposals should clearly demonstrate that project objectives do not duplicate already funded activities.
- Protection (including GBV prevention and response and child protection):
- Duration of Activity: Program plans for 24 or 36 months will be considered.
- Funding Limits: Program proposals must not be less than $500,000 per year and not more than $2,500,000 per year or they will be disqualified.
- Total Anticipated Amount to be Awarded: PRM anticipates, but makes no guarantee, to fund up to three awards, up to a per year total of $3,000,000, through this NOFO for Nepal and India.
- Sectors: Protection, Child Protection, GBV prevention and response, Health, Mental Health and Psychosocial Support, WASH, and Education. Priority activities within those sectors are suggested below.
- ROHINGYA in INDIA:
- Sectors: Protection, Child Protection, GBV prevention and response, Mental Health and Psychosocial Support. Priority activities will be those that propose engagement with existing structures and schemes.
- Protection (including GBV prevention and response and child protection):
- Provide protection services and/or referrals, such as legal assistance, to detained refugees and asylum seekers in India.
- Design and implement mechanisms to prevent and respond to gender-based violence (GBV) in communities and institutions. Improve knowledge of GBV risk-mitigation and promote positive changes in attitudes and behaviors within refugee communities through targeted and sustained engagement. Priority will be given to activities that seek to engage with existing structures and schemes to provide services to refugees, including those operated by national or local actors (both governmental and NGO), rather than establishing new, parallel structures.
- Increase the capacity of target communities to identify and effectively respond to GBV through skills building, training, and coaching.
- Protection (including GBV prevention and response and child protection):
- Duration of Activity: Program plans for 24 or 36 months will be considered.
- Funding Limits: Program proposals must not be less than $100,000 per year and not more than $300,000 per year or they will be disqualified.
- Total Anticipated Amount to be Awarded: PRM anticipates, but makes no guarantee, to fund up to two awards, for a total of up to $300,000 per year through this NOFO for India.
- Sectors: Protection, Child Protection, GBV prevention and response, Mental Health and Psychosocial Support. Priority activities will be those that propose engagement with existing structures and schemes.
Eligibility Criteria
- Nonprofits having a 501(c)(3) status with IRS, other than institutions of higher education;
- Nonprofits without 501(c)(3) status with IRS, other than institutions of higher education; and
- International Organizations.
- International multilateral organizations, such as United Nations agencies, should not submit proposals through Grants.gov in response to this Notice of Funding Opportunity. Multilateral organizations that are seeking funding for programs relevant to this announcement should contact the PRM Program Officer on or before the closing date of the funding announcement.
For more information, visit https://www.grants.gov/web/grants/view-opportunity.html?oppId=325310