EU Call for Proposals: Enhancing CSOs’ Contribution to Governance and Development Processes in Lao PDR

Deadline: 19 April 2019

The European Union (EU) is currently accepting proposals from eligible organisations for a program entitled “Civil Society Organisations: Enhancing CSOs’ Contribution to Governance and Development Processes in Lao PDR”.

Objectives

• The global objective of this call for proposals is to strengthen the capacity of Lao Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) to contribute to the achievement of the national development goals as per National Socio- Economic and Development plan 2016-2020 in Lao PDR.
• The specific objective(s) of this call for proposals are:
  • Support the increase of the participation of LAO CSO’s in preventing, addressing and/or mitigating risks of weak service delivery, with a focus on marginalised and vulnerable groups.

Priority Issues

The priority issues are the following:

• Projects can be conducted in one or more of the relevant sectors mentioned above , and must contribute to achieve both the global objective and the specific objective of the call for proposals.
• The action should prioritise areas/organisations where their capacity is weak and/or newly small organisations and avoid duplication of works already/being done by EU and/or other development partners.
• Particular attention should be paid to cross cutting issues contributing to the achievement of the global objective of the call for proposals.
• Actions must respect principles of non-discrimination (on the grounds of sex, racial or ethnic origin, religion or belief, disability, age or sexual orientation), human rights, the rule of law, good governance, gender equality and women’s empowerment as well as include cross cutting issues such as rights of minorities, of children and older people, rights of persons with disabilities and life-threatening diseases and rights of other vulnerable groups, core labour rights and social inclusion, environment and climate change, fight against HIV/AIDS and overall adopt a Right Based Approach according to the local situation. In addition, conflict prevention, promotion of dialogue, participation and reconciliation, as well as institution building shall be mainstreamed, where relevant. These crosscutting issues may also be the main target of a given action.

Expected Results

Key Expected Results of the programme include:

• Strengthened capacity of Lao CSOs to promote and provide improved access of marginalised and vulnerable groups to quality basic services in nutrition-sensitive support or primary/lower secondary education activities in Lao PDR;
• Enhanced Lao CSOs capacity and actions to participate in and contribute to the policy dialogue and accountability processes at local and national level including monitoring and implementation in nutrition-sensitive/nutrition-governance support or primary/lower secondary education or in Public Finance Management (PFM) in Lao PDR;
• Increased documentation sharing and dissemination of knowledge, experiences, networking among CSOs and/or between CSOs and LAs in a public policy related to one or more of the following areas: nutrition-sensitive service delivery, primary/lower secondary education, Public Finance Management

Size of Grants

Any grant requested under this call for proposals must fall between the following minimum and maximum amounts:

• Minimum amount: EUR 500 000
• Maximum amount: EUR 1 000 000

Eligibility Criteria

• Lead applicant
  • In order to be eligible for a grant, the lead applicant must:
    • be a legal person and
    • be non-profit-making and
    • be Civil Society Organisation and
    • be established in a Member State of the European Union  or in a Member State of the European Economic Area (EEA) or in Lao PDR  officially registered in accordance with the legislation in force in the country concerned .
    • For British applicants: Please be aware that eligibility criteria must be complied with for the entire duration of the grant. Unless sector-specific eligibility rules provide otherwise, if the United Kingdom withdraws from the EU during the grant period without concluding an agreement with the EU ensuring in particular that British applicants continue to be eligible, applicants will cease to receive EU funding (while continuing, where possible to participate) or will be required to leave the project on the basis of the grant agreement. 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
  • Potential applicants may not participate in calls for proposals or be awarded grants if they are in any of the situations
• Co-applicant(s)
  • Co-applicants 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-applicants must satisfy the eligibility criteria as applicable to the lead applicant himself.
• 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, as defined in Directive 2013/34/EU 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.

How to Apply

• The application procedure consists of two phases:
  • Concept notes
  • Full applications
• The concept note together with the declaration by the lead applicant must be submitted at the address given on the website.

For more information, please visit https://bit.ly/2GJuCDR and download the guidelines.