2023 Call for Proposals: Malaysia-UN SDG Trust Fund

Deadline: 14-Jul-23

The United Nations in Malaysia is pleased to announce a call for applications to encourage projects that make a positive impact on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in Malaysia.

The Malaysia-UN SDG Trust Fund (Fund) is a partnership between the United Nations (UN) in Malaysia and MySDG Foundation, supported by the Ministry of Finance.

The Fund supports projects that target people and communities who are at risk of being left behind. It encourages partnerships and collaboration across all sectors of society to ensure sustainable development benefits everyone. By focusing on local efforts, the Fund aims to improve the lives of people in different areas and groups, contributing to overall SDG progress in Malaysia.

The Call for Proposals 2023 (CFP-2023) is an invitation for innovative projects that prioritise a people-centric approach across the Fund’s three pillars and twelve priority areas. Projects should aim to foster multi-stakeholder partnerships in delivery and results through innovative solutions that can help the marginalised and disadvantaged overcome the challenges they face, and promote their inclusion and empowerment.

CFP-2023 seeks projects that address national SDG priorities and have a high potential for Leave No One Behind impact, enabling the country to achieve sustainable development for all and deliver on the 2030 Agenda’s principles and goals.

Thematic Pillars

• People and Prosperity
  • Priority Areas:
    • Promoting an inclusive recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, addressing the poverty, nutritional and health challenges of affected and marginal and excluded groups (e.g., informal sector workers, the poor and vulnerable in peripheral regions including indigenous peoples, women, youth, migrants and refugees, undocumented persons, and persons with disabilities).
    • Levelling up wider SDG performance in key human development domains across regions, focusing on communities in lagging peripheral areas.
    • Expanding resilience through greater social protection measures, focusing on excluded and under-served groups and those in informal work.
    • Addressing the specific human development needs of women at risk of being left behind.
    • Promoting work opportunities to the poor and vulnerable, those in informal work and those in remote locations, via access to skills training, financial services, commercial credit, and to decent jobs.
    • Addressing geographical and economic imbalances, especially those faced by communities living in remote locations, including by assisting them to unlock local comparative advantages (natural capital, sustainable exploitation of natural resources and products, enhanced tourism).
• Planet
  • Priority Areas:
    • Building the resilience of communities (groups and localities) at most risk to the impacts of climate change through active adaptation efforts.
    • Tackling biodiversity loss, particularly for marginal communities which rely on the natural capital for their livelihoods.
    • Assisting marginal communities to tackle land, sea and river pollution, which blights their living conditions.
• Peace and Partnership
  • Priority Areas:
    • Helping to build social and political cohesion between Malaysia’s diverse communities.
    • Enabling the realisation of key socioeconomic rights by marginal and excluded groups (e.g., the poor and vulnerable in peripheral regions including indigenous peoples, migrants and refugees, undocumented populations, and people with disabilities).
    • Enabling, within the law, the recognition of undocumented people and their social inclusion.

Funding Information

• Fund Allocation USD3.6 million
• Approximately MYR16,200,000 based on USD1= MYR4.50 exchange rate
• Project Size
  • Minimum: USD100,000
  • Maximum: USD500,000
• Project Duration
  • Minimum: 6 months
  • Maximum: 18 months.

Delivery criteria make up a further 30% and include:

• Level of jointness in delivery, i.e., multi-partner participation in project execution.
• Level of stakeholder engagement, particularly of targeted at-risk groups. The application of people-centric design methods and the integration of a whole-of-society approach will be viewed favourably.
• Quality of planning and management arrangements, including risk assessment and response.
• Quality of monitoring and evaluation (M&E) and follow-up, and reporting arrangements (internal and external), with appropriate levels of oversight.

Eligibility Criteria

• In line with the Fund’s thematic areas, the CFP-2023 will be open to proposals from:
  • UN agencies which are members of the Malaysia UN Country Team and have been recognised as Participating UN Organisations (PUNOs) in the Fund by endorsing the Fund’s MOU. Proposals submitted by PUNOs must involve at least two UN organisations.
  • Malaysia-based non-profit organisations such as civil society organisations (CSOs), non-governmental organisations (NGOs), academic institutions and think-tanks. Designated as non-UN organisations (NUNOs), these applicants must be registered in Malaysia. They will also be subject to due diligence procedures as required by UN rules and regulations.

Evaluation and Selection Process

• Proposals will be evaluated according to a set of substantive and delivery criteria:
  • Substantive criteria make up 70% of the initial scoring and include:
    • Level of alignment with the Fund’s thematic priorities listed under the three pillars, with weight given to the span and depth of the targeted SDG impacts.
    • Level of focus on vulnerable communities and groups at risk of being left behind (e.g., the unemployed and informal sector workers, indigenous people, women, youth, people with disabilities, older persons, migrants, refugees, stateless and undocumented persons etc.).
    • Extent of the wider catalytic impact generated (spillovers, scalability potential, demonstration effects etc.), linking also to the promotion of a whole-of-society approach to SDG achievement.
    • Alignment with the UN Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework (UNSDCF) for Malaysia, and/or with Malaysia’s national development priorities.

For more information, visit Malaysia-UN SDG Trust Fund.