Deadline: 8-Jan-23
NHS Blood and Transplant has announced the Community Grants Programme (formerly the Community Investment Scheme) to build support for donation amongst Black, Asian, mixed heritage and minority ethnic communities.
The programme builds upon the success of the Community Investment Scheme and funds community and faith/beliefs organisations to drive awareness, understanding and behaviour change. They know that trusted local organisations can be effective at achieving these goals due to their specialist knowledge, understanding and footprint in the community and they are seeking innovative ideas to support and provide sustainable and scalable investment to.
Priority Activity Focus
- Deceased organ donation: reach, conversations and registration
- Living kidney donation: reach, conversations (successful applicants will be connected with their local transplant centre)
- Blood: registration (all activity must target Black African and Caribbean communities)
- Stem cell: reach, conversations, registrations (project activity should predominantly target 16-40 year olds)
Why is the programme needed?
- Ethnicity is a multidimensional concept with many links to health. The Community Grants Programme will help tackle some of the health inequalities affecting people from Black, Asian, mixed heritage and minority ethnic backgrounds.
- It aims to address the shortage of Black blood donors whose blood is used to treat conditions like sickle cell, the shortage of ethnically matched organs for those waiting for a transplant in all Black, Asian, mixed heritage and minority ethnic communities, and the need for ethnically matched stem cell donors.
- Establishing and building trust in these communities is key. Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities have been disproportionately affected by COVID-19, and research shows they are less likely to view government policies in a positive light or trust government messages.
- Through the Community Grants Programme, they look to work with grassroots organisations to engage, educate and recruit more donors as clinical data shows that ethnically matched blood, organs and stem cells provide the best treatment. Successful organisations will have the opportunity to apply for sustainable multi-year investment funding after 12 months to deepen or scale their work.
Funding Information
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Applicants can apply for the following funding bands. Please note the restrictions associated with the highest band.
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Funds between £1 and £2,499
- Organisations looking to deliver a project focusing on blood donation, stem cell donation, living kidney donation, deceased organ donation or combined deceased organ and blood donation projects can apply for this funding band.
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Funds between £2,500 – £10,000
- Organisations looking to deliver a project focusing on blood donation, stem cell donation, living kidney donation, deceased organ donation or combined deceased organ and blood donation projects can apply for this funding band.
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Funds between £10,001 and £20,000
- Organisations looking to deliver a project focusing on blood donation, stem cell donation, living kidney donation or combined deceased organ and blood donation projects can apply for this funding band.
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Projects focused only on deceased organ donation cannot apply for this funding band.
- Organisations applying for funding at this band must have previous experience of working with either a government department (ministerial or non-ministerial) or a public body e.g. NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT), NHS England etc. Applicants must be able to show the impact achieved through these partnerships.
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Funds between £1 and £2,499
- Additional information
- Please note that all activity around blood donation must be aimed at the Black African and Black Caribbean communities and must be carried out in England.
- Duration: All projects for the new funding round will be 12 month projects, running from April 2023 to April 2024.
Eligibility Criteria
- The programme is open to organisations. These could include registered charities, limited companies, charitable incorporated organisations, community interest companies, or unincorporated groups.
- Bidding organisations are required to provide details of their organisation in the application form. If planning to work with partner organisations, applicants must outline this in the “partners” section of the application form.
Ineligible
- An individual cannot apply on their own behalf as all financial grants need to be made to organisations.
- If an individual has an idea and wants to put in an application, they need to align with an organisation that is willing to put in the application on their behalf, take responsibility for funding, project delivery and reporting.
- Any organisation that is not a registered charity or organisation with its own bank account is not able to receive funding. Therefore, if an organisation is in this situation and wants to put in a bid, they need to align with a partner organisation that is willing to take responsibility for the application, funding, project delivery and reporting.
- They do not accept applications from marketing, PR or advertising agencies, research bodies or market research organisations.
- The programme is designed to support projects that engage with and inform Black, Asian, mixed heritage or minority ethnic or faith/belief communities. They do not look to fund research projects.
- They are not accepting applications from current staff members of NHS Blood and Transplant.
For more information, visit NHS Blood and Transplant.