Deadline: 31-Jan-24
Grand Challenges (GC) partners including GC Africa (Science for Africa Foundation), GC Brazil (Ministry of Health of Brazil), GC Ethiopia (Armauer Hansen Research Institute (AHRI)), GC India (Department of Biotechnology of India), and GC Rwanda (National Council for Science and Technology), along with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Pasteur Network, and supported by Wellcome, Foundation S-the Sanofi Collective, and the Rockefeller Foundation are launching this request for proposals (RFP) to identify and support promising innovations.
The Grand Challenges family of initiatives seeks to source and seed innovations and accelerate the development of transformational solutions.
This Grand Challenges request for proposals seeks innovative research and pilot/feasibility projects utilizing transdisciplinary approaches to better adapt to, mitigate, or reverse the combined, deleterious effects of climate change on health, women’s lives, and agriculture in the geographies of interest. These innovations include early warning and disease surveillance systems to respond to climate-event-driven surges in malaria and other vector borne diseases, as well as improved mapping of expanded vector ranges and vector-borne disease transmission. Preference will be given to innovations that are formulated locally or adapted from other contexts. They are especially interested in 1) locally led, system-level innovations that are scalable and sustainable and 2) cross-cutting solutions at the intersection of multiple scientific and engineering disciplines.
Topic Areas
- Health Outcomes – including systemic and compounding impacts of climate change on health. They are seeking solutions targeting:
- Early Warning and Disease Surveillance: They seek proposals that build resilient systems to mitigate health impact of climate change. Solutions may include accurate surveillance systems for early detection of vector-borne, waterborne, and zoonotic diseases; that predict the impact of climate-related events (heat, flood, population, vegetation, and zoonotic migration) and vectors and diseases introduced to new localities. Where possible, employment opportunities should be created for rural women. (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; Brazil) b.
- Gender Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion: Women are disproportionately impacted by climate-sensitive health risks. Women are themselves a vulnerable group, and they can also fall into many other vulnerable groups. As such, they seek solutions that address the increased risks related to maternal, newborn, and child health. Solutions should address gender disparities in access to food, health care, education, and economic well-being. Also of interest are solutions that address the vulnerability to forms of gender-based violence and post-traumatic stress disorders arising from climate change-driven conflict. (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; Brazil)
- Community Health Ecosystems: They are looking for proposals that strengthen the resilience and adaptability of health care service delivery and supply chains to climate related changes. These solutions can include anticipatory action, adaptation of provisions, quality, and accessibility of essential services to vulnerable communities, especially women, capacity building for health care professionals and community health actors. They are also interested in solutions that help individuals and families respond locally to new ailments and challenges brought about by climate-related events. (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; Brazil)
- Measurement & Evaluation (M&E): They encourage proposals focused on development of harmonized M&E frameworks and systems for programs that better incorporate climate considerations. (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; Brazil)
- Nutrition – Undernutrition is a consequence of climate change — and it makes people more susceptible to its effects, particularly extreme heat exposure which poses unique risks for pregnant women, newborns, and infants under 2 years old. They are seeking solutions that address:
- Heat stress and nutritional status, in particular gestation weight gain, low birth weight, preterm birth, small for gestational age, early growth faltering (in children <6 months), and child wasting. (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; South Asia; Brazil)
- Heat stress and micronutrient status, including anemia and breastmilk quality.
- Improved real-time monitoring and surveillance of wasting and the spatial relationship between climate vulnerability and undernutrition. (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; South Asia; Brazil)
- Integration of climate risk into social protection schemes and the inclusion of nutrition products and services as part of an essential nutrition package within social safety net programs. (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; South Asia; Brazil)
- Innovation in the composition of specialized nutritious foods (e.g., RUTFs to treat severe acute malnutrition), considering susceptibility of raw ingredients to climate shocks, price volatility, and decreased nutritional quality. (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; South Asia; Brazil)
- Adaptation Strategies for Agriculture and Income Development, with a focus on women’s agriculture livelihoods.
- The production of synthetic nitrogen fertilizers is energy-intensive and contributes to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. For every kilogram of Nitrogen (N) produced by synthetic process, 10.1Kg of CO2 is emitted. Biofertilizers present great promise in reducing emissions associated with synthetic fertilizer production and providing nitrogen fixation needed for productive plants. The technological gap in validating this innovation lies in the lack of robust field measurements, which, when addressed by accurately measuring Biological Nitrogen Fixation (BNF), can help develop strategies to reduce GHG emissions, fertilizer runoff, and water pollution. Research may also comprise innovative methods for proving candidate microbes are indeed drawing nitrogen from the atmosphere for direct or indirect crop benefit, rather than mining the soil. (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; South Asia; Brazil)
- Climate and weather information are fundamental for agricultural decision making and become even more essential amid changes in temperature and rainfall patterns. Women are typically underrepresented as users of climate decision support, due to cultural norms or technological gaps, and even more underrepresented as innovators and providers of climate services. They are looking for innovation solutions for scaling access to climate decision support provided by women- and youth-run, micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs). This may include women- and youth-run small and medium enterprises (SMEs) integrating climate information services or a climate service provider innovating ways to partner with women- and youth-run SMEs. (Geography of interest: sub-Saharan Africa)
- Women face multiple systemic disadvantages that reduce their capacity to adapt to climate change. They seek proposals on three topics related to women’s resilience: (1) Climate-smart labor-saving technologies for rural women that are affordable and accessible with potential for scale, (2) Identifying opportunities for rural women’s organizations to influence national climate adaptation plans, and (3) Gender transformative climate-smart innovations for livelihood diversification on and off farm in food systems. Cross-cutting topics of interest include access to capital, upskilling, digital tools, social norms, expanding market access, and support for young women and adolescent girls. (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; South Asia)
- Knowledge Management and Data Integration of Climate and Health Databases – Many vectorborne diseases may increase in localities that were not prepared for them before the advent of climate-change. They seek solutions that integrate data from climate scientists, disease modelers, and government health officials to help address the rise of specific diseases. Potential areas of interest include, but are not limited to:
- Facilitating community participation in/crowd-sourcing data collection to track climate change impact at local level (e.g., changes in weather patterns or detection of invasive vector species) (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; Brazil)
- Integrating commercially available databases and local data into early warning systems that can drive decision making, working to ensure sex-disaggregated data when relevant. (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; Brazil)
- Researching the relationship between climate change and the spread of vector-borne diseases (e.g., changes to vector populations or disease transmission dynamics) to develop early warning systems to prevent outbreaks. (Geographies of interest: sub-Saharan Africa; Brazil)
- Effective Response and Resilient Supply Chains for Crisis Management – Maintaining routine health delivery or non-routine campaigns such as humanitarian aid and vaccination efforts will be an increasingly multifaceted problem as the need for rapid, directed humanitarian aid increases in the face of extreme climate events, examples include changing landscapes for roads and bridges; Internally Displaced People (IDPs) and armed conflicts; and disrupted daily routines for affected populations. They are seeking to implement agile, resilient supply chains that allow for the re-deployment of interventions based on need, e.g., malaria insecticide-treated nets, preventive chemotherapies, etc. against vector-borne diseases. (Geography of interest: sub-Saharan Africa)
Funding Information
- The funding level is up to USD $200,000.00, for each grant. The period of performance is up to two years.
They are looking for proposals that:
- Demonstrate that projects are led by (Low- and Middle-Income Countries (LMIC) i investigators, local stakeholders, or community-led organizations. Global partners may be included, but proposals must demonstrate at least 80% of the funding is going to an investigator in an LMIC institution within the geography of interest. Teams comprising multiple LMIC institutions will be given preference over applicants from single institutions. They also encourage multi-country collaborations.
- Come from women-led organizations or involve projects led by women and focused on reaching women.
- Articulate how the project will lead to near-term impact and how the impact will be sustained over the lifetime of the project and beyond.
- Articulate the scalability of the solution beyond a small local region or population. Strong consideration will be given to approaches that can scale to multiple geographic areas, demographic groups, etc.
- Demonstrate engagement with local and/or regional communities, decision-makers, and adopters.
- Promote inter-sectoral co-ordination and collaboration.
Eligibility Criteria
- This RFP is open to organizations based in sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia (Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka) and Brazil, including nonprofit organizations, for-profit companies, international organizations, government agencies and academic institutions. Please review the RFP topic /sub-areas closely for specific guidance on geographic area(s) of focus for each. Collaborations with global partners is acceptable, however, at least 80% of the funding needs to be awarded directly to organizations based in low- and middle-income countries. Individuals and organizations classified as individuals for U.S. tax purposes are not eligible to receive an award from the foundation as part of this initiative.
- Upon registration, applicants must provide information about the tax status of their organization as different terms and conditions may apply. You should confirm your organization’s tax status with the appropriate advisor or entity within your organization such as your grants or contracts department, finance, or office of sponsored research. The foundation may request additional information regarding your tax status.
Ineligible
- They will not fund proposals that:
- Do not support communities and countries to adapt and be resilient to the effects of climate change on agriculture, health and gender in the geography of interest.
- Do not demonstrate that the majority of the work proposed will be undertaken by investigators and/or local stakeholders living in the geography of interest.
- Do not plan for or demonstrate a pathway to sustainable impact and scalability.
- Are not linked to or have no plan to engage relevant key stakeholders and decision makers from the affected communities.
For more information, visit Grand Challenges.