Deadline: 30-Aug-21
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) mission in Serbia in cooperation with the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) is seeking applications for a cooperative agreement from qualified entities to implement the Civil Society Resilience Strengthening activity.
Goal: Civil society is more resilient to shrinking civic space challenges and able to better perform its watchdog, advocacy and citizen engagement roles as a result of an improved enabling environment.
Objectives
- Improved ability of civil society organizations to respond to new and emerging civic space challenges: While Serbia has generally a well developed and active civil society, the sector’s ability to remain resilient and respond jointly to emerging challenges has been spotty. Some challenges like new legislation and IT/cyber threats, require new knowledge and skills not widely understood or practiced by Serbia’s CSOs. In addition, understanding and planning for legal defense as well as litigation strategies are new areas that should be explored.
- Improved Enabling Environment for Civil Society: According to USAID’s Civil Society Sustainability Index, the score for the legal enabling environment for civil society has been declining for four years in a row. While this has primarily been due to factors related to “harassment” and limited engagement of civil society organizations in policy development, there has also been a lack of structured dialogue and systemic action around different factors and policies affecting civil society.
Funding Information
- USAID intends to award one Cooperative Agreement pursuant to this notice of funding opportunity. Subject to funding availability and at the discretion of the Agency, USAID contribution to the activity is $6,000,000 and anticipated additional contribution of $3,000,000 from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), at the total estimated amount of $9,000,000, over the 5-year period of performance.
Eligibility Criteria
- Through this RFA, USAID seeks to make awards to organizations and/or partnerships that can make concrete and meaningful contributions to sustainably strengthen Serbia’s civil society resiliency by provision of capacity building, technical support, advocacy, public awareness and cross sectoral cooperation.
- Eligibility for this RFA is not restricted. All U.S. and non-U.S. public, private, for-profit, and nonprofit organizations, as well as institutions of higher education, parochial, and other non-governmental organizations, are eligible to submit an application. Further, the organization must be a legally recognized organizational entity under applicable law. Foreign governmentowned parastatal organizations from countries that are ineligible for assistance under the Foreign Assistance Act (FAA) or related appropriations acts are ineligible. Applications from individuals will not be accepted nor reviewed.
- Each applicant organization is limited to one application submission as the Prime applicant. There is no limitation on being included as a potential Sub-awardee. USAID discourages the use of exclusive teaming arrangements.
For more information, visit https://www.grants.gov/web/grants/view-opportunity.html?oppId=334741