USAID Locally Led Development Grants for NGOs in Paraguay

Deadline: 16-Feb-24

The USAID/Paraguay is making a special call to local actors for the submission of concepts focused on Local Capacity Strengthening (LCS) for Paraguayan Organizations Working in Development.

Objectives

• The objective of this Addendum is to strengthen the capacity of Paraguayan organizations to be more equipped to lead and respond to development issues, while leveraging local resources, capacity, and assets in a collaborative manner among local stakeholders. This will be accomplished through the provision of technical assistance, training, and resource mobilization support to existing networks. These networks may include development organizations, academia, and public and private sector stakeholders. The technical assistance will promote sustainability and local leadership by engaging broad networks to respond to development issues through local solutions, using local resources, and sustaining results that matter to local organizations.

Funding Information

• Award Ceiling: $2,000,000

Intended Overall Result

• The objective of this Addendum is to strengthen the capacity of Paraguayan organizations to lead and respond to development issues, while leveraging local resources, capacity, and assets in a collaborative manner among local stakeholders. The Applicant should address the following two approaches in the concept paper.
  • Result 1 – Improve local organizations’ access to tailored capacity strengthening.
    • The local industry of capacity strengthening services for development organizations is believed to be underdeveloped, mainly due to financial limitations to pay for such services. For the same reason, local organizational development service providers do not usually serve this type of clients, making the supply sector not fully responsive to their needs.
  • Result 2 – Strengthen networks between organizations.
    • Strengthened networks could increase trust between development organizations and other local stakeholders of the system like the government, the private sector, and civil society writ large. Additionally, a stronger network can help local organizations develop and/or promote convening and advocacy skills, and help strengthen the capacity of its own members. USAID does not envision the applicant supporting the creation of new networks, but to strengthen those already existing in the local system.

Locally Led Development Approaches

• Applicants are encouraged to incorporate one or more of the following approaches in submissions, or propose a different approach(es) that reflects the Applicant’s own locally led development learning goals.
  • Mechanisms that improve the flow of information among the applicant and its own constituents, partners, and USAID to strengthen accountability to local constituents for achieving and sustaining results.
  • Participatory analytical approaches, which may provide a better understanding of the complex environments in which the program will operate.
  • Participatory decision-making, which includes locally led priority-setting, collaborative design, and other means of shifting decision-making power and control to local actors, including people who have traditionally been marginalized, such as women, youth, religious and ethnic minorities, LGBTQI+, and gender diverse people, ensuring inclusive local leadership.
  • Mobilizing local resources, which includes local philanthropy; partnerships that leverage resources from the local private sector, faith-based organizations, government, civil society, and academia; and other sources of local skills and finances to replace those of international donors.
  • Strengthening local networks, which may include understanding and supporting existing and emerging networks of local actors, supporting the work of local organizations, market facilitation, collective action, collective impact, and other demand-driven approaches to connecting local needs with local resources.
  • Locally/community-led approaches to design, monitoring, evaluation, and learning that prioritize local/community definitions of success and enhance local actors’ role in managing and using data and learning related to development solutions, the development process, and the sustainability of results achieved.
  • Strengthening local capacity, which includes strengthening the role of local institutions and actors to sustain development outcomes with an eye toward ending the need for foreign assistance.
  • Adapting and problem solving in non-permissive environments, where uncertainty, instability, inaccessibility, or insecurity constrain the ability to operate safely and effectively. This may include environments such as those affected by natural disasters, inaccessible physical geographies, active conflict, corruption, closing political spaces, criminality, and pandemics, where local approaches are essential for long-term resilience and sustainability.

Eligibility Criteria

• USAID welcomes concepts from a wide variety of local actors who bring an understanding of the development challenges facing their communities, countries, or regions or who demonstrate a way to determine local priorities in their approach. Eligible applicants:
  • Must be local entities in Paraguay. When determining if an entity is a “local entity” for the purposes of this APS, USAID will consider:
    • Whether the entity is legally organized under the laws of Paraguay;
    • Whether the entity has its principal place of business or operations in Paraguay;
    • Whether the entity is majority owned and controlled by individuals who are citizens or lawful permanent residents of Paraguay; and
    • Whether the entity is managed by a governing body, the majority of whom are citizens or lawful permanent residents of Paraguay.
  • Cannot have received more than $5 million in direct funding (as a prime awardee) from USAID (Paraguay or globally) in the previous five fiscal years.
  • Cannot be a U.S.-based organization. U.S.-based organizations are not eligible as prime awardees under this APS.

For more information, visit Grants.gov.