Deadline: 24-Jul-2024
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is seeking applications for a Cooperative Agreement from qualified entities to implement the Stability Through Economic Progress, Unity and Peacebuilding (STEP UP) Program.
USAID/Mozambique seeks to provide funding and capacity support to local businesses and CSOs through a partner managed grant-making mechanism. By providing businesses and CSOs with funds to implement economic, peace, and social development initiatives, the Activity will foster increased engagement and empowerment in terms of communities driving their own local development.
Funding Information
- USAID intends to award 1 (one) Cooperative Agreement pursuant to this notice of funding opportunity. Subject to funding availability and at the discretion of the Agency, USAID intends to provide up to $15,000,000 in total USAID funding over a 5 (five) year period.
Technical Approach
- The Activity will primarily support local businesses and CSOs within select communities through the provision of small grants that will enable them to respond to specific issues or challenges, as identified by community leaders, members, and local government officials. Small grants will be available to both start-up and existing businesses, CSOs, and individual entrepreneurs, as long as proposed interventions address the identified challenges in a non-discriminatory, conflict-sensitive, and innovative manner. The implementing partner will also work with USAID and the SPCPS Task Force to design grant opportunities aimed at achieving specific objectives.
- Additionally, The Activity will include a capacity development component to promote grantees’ abilities to identify and manage future funds from USAID or other donors. This award will require the implementing partner to identify and recommend a local subrecipient to USAID for a potential transition award in accordance with ADS 303mbb, including being responsible for developing the local subrecipient’s capacity and tracking progress towards meeting the criteria for a transition award. While USAID intends to make a transition award to a qualified local subrecipient, there is no guarantee and is based on USAID discretion, funding, and Mission priorities.
Principles
- The below principles are crucial to the success of this Activity:
- Promote locally-led development: The Activity will work through local channels to engage groups, associations and businesses that are often disenfranchised from funding or capacity opportunities. USAID is interested in partnering with organizations that have a strong local presence in Cabo Delgado and are able to establish connections with communities that extend beyond town centers and that demonstrate an understanding of local context.
- Focus on youth: Given the large number of unemployed youth in this region, this Activity will place an added emphasis on supporting youth-led businesses and organizations. Partners should propose approaches that consider the challenges and opportunities that youth in Northern Mozambique face. In addition to designing small grant opportunities that are accessible to youth, partners are expected to seek ways to engage youth in the design and implementation of the small grants process.
- Adaptability and Flexibility: This mechanism is meant to be flexible in the case of shifts in context and needs. MEL and CLA plans should be designed to inform adaptation and learning, drawing from stakeholder feedback, including local communities, business and civil society stakeholder, and USG input. Partners should have measures in place and be prepared to quickly adapt to contextual changes.
- Coordinate: As there are many development and recovery efforts underway in Northern Mozambique, it is imperative that STEP UP coordinate with other stakeholders to identify opportunities for collaborative and appropriate geographic and sectoral coverage. STEP UP is expected to participate in development coordinator efforts, business/association platforms, and government development agencies. The Activity must also liaise with the private sector to appropriately link grant activities to a viable and sustainable future.
- Do No Harm: Given the complexities of the operating environment and the existing tensions and grievances of communities, this Activity should be implemented with a conflict-sensitive approach and principles of Do No Harm should be incorporated throughout. Applicants should describe measures to reduce harm and account for existing sensitivities. The partner should describe risks and mitigation measures to ensure grants avoid elite capture, are not provided to members or former members of Non-state Armed Groups (NSAGs), and other common challenges in this context.
Result Framework
- Intermediate Result 1: Increased Opportunities for Private Sector Growth, Diversification, and Job Creation
- IR1.1: Increased access to resources for business start-up or expansion.
- IR1.2: Increased revenue of supported private sector entities.
- IR1.3: Increased number of people, particularly youth, engaged in productive labor.
- Interventions under IR1 will focus on supporting the private sector with the aim to grow and diversify livelihoods while supporting local job creation. One of the drivers of the instability in northern Mozambique is the perception of disenfranchisement and lack of economic opportunities, especially for youth. There is a large and growing youth population, yet there is a severe shortage of jobs. Local populations are frustrated at the perception that foreigners and Mozambicans from outside Cabo Delgado are getting many of the jobs and contracts created through the extractive sector, often due to the lack of appropriate skills on the local market, or the inability of local businesses to meet supply criteria. To this end, it is important that this Activity provides resources and opportunities that can reach local citizens, enterprises, and organizations to strengthen their ability to grow, thrive, and compete.
- Illustrative Activities:
- Start-up grants: for individual entrepreneurs looking to launch a new business.
- Growth grants: for companies needing capital to expand current business with intent to bring on additional staff.
- Livelihood grants: for NGOs or CSOs looking to grow or develop a certain industry and provide sustainable work for the local community (i.e. fisheries, poultry/egg, agriculture etc.)
- District-specific grants: for supporting local employment in a specific district
- Sector Grants: for supporting a specific sector and its value chain (e.g. fisheries, agriculture, tourism, technology, etc.)
- Scale-up/Initiative grants: for scaling up CSR or socioeconomic development activities with the private sector (e.g. support for businesses engaged with initiatives such as CD Parks)
- Financial Inclusion grants: for community based financial inclusion initiatives, such as Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLA)
- Intermediate Result 2: Increased Social Cohesion within Communities
- IR2.1: Increased connectedness within and among youth and vulnerable populations
- IR2.2: Increased inclusion of youth and vulnerable populations in community decisions, events and processes
- IR2.3: Increased access to information and civic space
- Grants programs will also target local civil society structures and actors that are not typically within reach of USAID programming, but who are best positioned to anticipate the needs of communities. Funds should bolster relationships, connectedness, and accountability across three layers of programming, explained in detail below. USAID expects interested IPs to propose robust processes for community engagement and for reaching small community-based organizations (CBOs) that the Agency does not usually work with.
- The Activity aims to increase social cohesion within communities by building strong connections between community members and groups that are traditionally marginalized or excluded from community decisions and decision-making processes.
- The implementing partner will make grants to local civil societies and other groups focused on building horizontal cohesion, strengthening relationships among people of different social, cultural, faith and/or linguistic backgrounds. Depending on community needs, interventions may overlap and directly support those from IR1; for example, financial inclusion grants could bolster IR1 and IR2 simultaneously through joint resource management at the community level. The IRs are not mutually exclusive, and the implementing partner is expected to look for those opportunities that improve social cohesion while recognizing that economic opportunities also play a critical role in the success of social cohesion efforts. For example, grants could be made to support a sector such as fisheries with a component focused on how fisherpersons work together and advocate for one another.
- Illustrative Activities:
- Grants for group dialogues on issues and opportunities to promote cohesion and reconciliation and psychosocial support or skill building for resilience and confidence
- Grants for CSOs or associations to organize events and recreational activities including community arts and sports activities that encourage participation by community members
- Capacity building and resource grants for community natural resource management committees
- Grants to support community planning discussion and social contracts between communities and local leaders to solve identified issues; community/civil-society led monitoring of social contracts or commitments, or support to community radio, local journalists and media outlets
- Grants to expand mutual savings groups, such as Village Savings and Loans (VSLAs)
- Intermediate Result 3: Increased Capacity of Local Organizations and Businesses to Become Financially Sustainable
- IR3.1: Increased financial and management skills for grant recipients
- IR3.2: Improved knowledge of accessing resources
- This Activity will work with organizations that USAID may not typically reach. This will require creative and proactive outreach on the part of the implementing partner through leveraging various media, advertising, community outreach and social networks. To promote fairness and transparency in the grant solicitation process, grant information should be available in local languages and the implementing partner should have a workforce that is representative of local ethnicities and languages. Small grant application processes should be both transparent and accessible, leveraging non-traditional means such as oral applications when necessary.
- Illustrative Activities:
- Establish partnerships with local businesses and CSOs to implement small grant programs
- Develop training materials for selected institutions in financial management, monitoring and evaluation, and small grant implementation; explore non-traditional training methods
- Develop an assessment plan to help inform future activities, understand local context, adapt to meet the needs of the communities, and learn from failures and successes
- Establish financial management systems for the distribution of funds from USAID to the implementor, then to local businesses/CSOs, and finally to small grant awardees
- Establish “support groups” for small grant recipients to share best practices, lessons learned, and challenges (especially for youth recipients and new entrepreneurs)
- Measure community-level economic growth and development, applying CLA principals to improve outcomes
- Identify potential eligible subrecipient and track progress against benchmarks towards meeting the criteria for a transition award.
Eligibility Criteria
- Eligibility for this NOFO is not restricted.
- USAID welcomes applications from organizations that have not previously received financial assistance from USAID.
- Faith-based organizations are eligible to apply for federal financial assistance on the same basis as any other organization and are subject to the protections and requirements of Federal law.
For more information, visit Grants.gov.
