Call for Proposals: Access to Social Inclusion Services at Local Level (Bosnia and Herzegovina)

Deadline: 8-Jan-24

The European Commission (EC) has announced a call for proposals to contribute to improving socio-economic situation and living conditions in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Objectives

• The specific objective(s) of this call for proposals are:
  • Specific objective 1: Provide support to at least 10 local communities in the development of a sustainable system for the social inclusion of vulnerable groups that can later be spread as a model in other local communities.
  • Specific objective 2: To establish local partnerships in solving the problem of social inclusion that is interdisciplinary coordinated by local authorities by one key institution
  • Specific objective 3: Direct support to the developed local partnership program(s) in addressing identified needs of vulnerable categories.
  • The action will achieve these objectives by supporting and strengthening local partnership(s) including local authorities, CSOs and other relevant institutions (educational institutions, centar for social work, centre for employment, police, businesses etc.) in addressing better social inclusion of the targeted vulnerable categories.

Priorities

• The priorities of this call for proposals are:
  • To facilitate implementation and enforcement of public human rights-related policies and improve their effectiveness in terms of transparency, inclusiveness, equal opportunities and accessibility, reach, service quality, environmental protection and gender-responsiveness
  • Increase the meaningful participation of women, youth, Roma and other less-represented
    groups of citizens in all spheres of public life
  • Strengthened capacities of local authorities, including in sustainable monitoring, programming and addressing needs of vulnerable categories

Sectors or Themes

• Women’s empowerment;
• Non-discrimination, rights of persons belonging to minorities with a special focus on Roma;
• Advancing equal participation and leadership;
• Addressing the challenges and harnessing the opportunities offered by the green transition and the digital transformation;
• Human rights in business;
• Youth and children;
• Access to education, employment, health etc.
• Work-life balance and economy of care;
• Unpaid domestic work for women;
• Other as identified in the BiH Country Report under Fundamental rights.

Funding Information

• The overall indicative amount made available under this call for proposals is EUR 500,000. The contracting authority reserves the right not to award all available funds.
• Size of grants
  • Any grant requested under this call for proposals must fall between the following minimum and maximum amounts:
    • minimum amount: EUR 450,000
    • maximum amount: EUR 500,000

Duration

• The initial planned duration of an action may not be lower than 26 months nor exceed 36 months.

Types of Activities

• While the type of activities to support the above priority areas are to be proposed by the applicant, the following non-exhaustive list of examples can be given:
  • Networking and structuring of networks;
  • Community mobilisation;
  • Civic education;
  • Civic advocacy;
  • Drafting of policy recommendations;
  • Legislation review;
  • Social service delivery;
  • Community based initiatives;
  • Promotion of volunteerism;
  • Preparation and delivery of action plans;
  • Joint activities with public institutions and local authorities, schools and parents;
  • Consultations, conferences, workshops, seminars, roundtables;
  • Awareness raising events, advocacy campaigns, public communication activities (TV and radio programmes, websites), publications;
  • Studies, research, opinion surveys and analytical papers;
  • Services delivery;
  • Study trips and cross-regional and international cooperation and exchange.

Location

• Actions must take place in Bosnia and Herzegovina in identified municipalities/cities.

Eligibility Criteria

• Lead applicant(s)
  • In order to be eligible for a grant, the lead applicant must:
    • be a legal person, and
    • be non-profit-making, and
    • be a specific type of organisation such as: non-governmental organisation, public sector operator, local authority, international (inter-governmental) organisation as defined by Article 156 of the EU Financial Regulation, and
    • be established in a Member State of the European Union or IPA countries. This obligation does not apply to international organisations, and
    • have had experience in working at local community level, and have managed similar size of grant contract as the one subject of this Action, 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.
• Co-applicant(s)
  • The Lead applicant may or may not act with co-applicant(s).
  • Co-applicant(s) 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-applicant(s) must satisfy the eligibility criteria as applicable to the lead applicant himself.
  • In addition to the categories referred, the following are however also eligible:
    • private sector non-profit agencies;
    • local traders’ associations and citizen’s groups;
    • non-profit-making universities;
    • the not-for-profit media;
    • cooperatives; employers’ associations and trade unions (social partners);
    • business development organisations, business associations.
  • Co-applicant(s) must sign the mandate form.
• Affiliated entities
  • 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 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.

For more information, visit European Commission (EC).