USAID/Papua New Guinea Peace Project

Deadline: 22-Feb-24

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is seeking applications for a cooperative agreement from qualified entities to implement the USAID/Papua New Guinea Peace Project.

The goal of this project is to enhance the ability of communities, civil society, and local institutions in PNG to work in partnership to prevent and peacefully respond to conflict, and further increase the safe, meaningful participation of women across society.

The expected result is that empowered citizens, especially women, can effectively and peacefully advocate for more accountable, responsive, and transparent local institutions. The project aims to employ a bottom-up approach to engage ordinary citizens, local communities, provincial governments, and sub-national and international partners to build on existing strengths and prevent internal and external threats from growing into broader conflicts or crises.

Priorities

• Countering Gender-Based Violence: PNG remains one of the most dangerous places to be a woman or girl, where violence against women and children is rampant. More than two-thirds of the women in PNG are victims of domestic violence, and they deserve to be full participants in a safe and inclusive environment.
• Youth Inclusion: In PNG, youth between the ages of 10 and 24 constitute over a third of the population. Youth in PNG are grappling with a myriad of challenges including restricted access to educational and professional opportunities; limited access to services; and high rates of unemployment. Despite commitments by the Government of PNG to support greater youth participation and inclusion in decision making, their inclusion remains a significant challenge. To ensure that development outcomes are sustainable, the inclusion of youth as equal partners in development processes is essential.
• Disability Inclusion: Despite the existence of a national disability policy, PNG has yet to pass comprehensive persons with disabilities legislation. Persons with disabilities are often “invisible” members of society and are unable to participate in normal community life, attend school, or work because of lack of accessibility, stigma, and other barriers.
• Economic Marginalization and Inequality of Opportunity: Despite PNG’s rich natural resources, corruption and poor public service delivery often prevents wealth from reaching rural communities. Discrepancies in wealth and opportunity are pronounced along the rural-urban and gender divides. Inequality of opportunity, especially disparities in access to banking, clean drinking water, skilled birth attendants, and electricity, exacerbates economic inequality and reduces social mobility, according to a UNESCAP report. Low connectivity to the electrical grid and a poorly maintained, sparse road network also slows economic growth and perpetuates inequality.
• Localization: The Peace Project will be aligned with USAID’s Local Capacity Strengthening Policy. The Recipient will be expected to prioritize local partnerships and propose a sub-grant program for implementation of activities by local stakeholders to support partnerships and programs that equitably empower a diverse array of local actors and facilitate local leadership so that development assistance is more effective and sustainable.

Funding Information

• USAID intends to award one (1) Cooperative Agreement pursuant to this notice of funding opportunity. Subject to funding availability and at the discretion of the Agency, USAID intends to provide not more than USD $26 million in total USAID funding over a five (5) year period.
• The anticipated period of performance is five (5) years. The estimated start date will be included in the final award.

Peace Project Results Framework

• Objective: Promote Peace and Improve Livelihood Opportunities
  • At the end of the project USAID expects that communities are better equipped to prevent, mitigate, and respond to conflict peacefully, and economic opportunities to improve livelihoods, promote private sector development, and empower communities, women in particular, to invest in their own development.
  • Because women are especially disempowered, specific efforts should target women’s empowerment and gender equity as a way to address some of the key underlying factors that lead individuals to resort to violence. In order to help remedy these issues, the Applicant should focus on supporting grassroots and local efforts that provide essential services and support, and promote self-reliance, responsiveness, and resiliency.
  • To promote peace-building and conflict prevention, the Project should strengthen the ability of communities to develop, participate in and lead conflict mitigation, mediation, peacebuilding, address the impact of climate change, and enhance good governance mechanisms and processes by improving local leadership and the capacity of local organizations, and by supporting local solutions, with emphasis on community-level initiatives.
• Intermediate Result (IR) 1: Conflict Prevention and Peacebuilding Capacity Developed or Strengthened
  • Conflict has always been a part of the complex relationships among PNG’s hundreds of microsocieties, but the scale of violence has increased in recent decades. Women and girls have been a target of the majority of this violence and, in recent years, have advocated, along with others, for their equality, security and increased political power.
  • Sub-IR 1.1
    • Mechanisms for conflict prevention and management strengthened;
  • Sub-IR 1.2
    • Incidents of gender-based and sorcery-accusation related violence reduced and victims provided with improved support and services;
  • Sub-IR 1.3
    • Women and youth’s participation in conflict management structures and processes increased; and,
  • Sub-IR 1.4
    • Community-driven activities promote reconciliation and stability.
  • Illustrative Activities:
    • Support the improvement of collaborative protocols and formal and informal systems between local village court magistrates and other community-based structures, including community peace committees and other local peacebuilding, human rights, women’s networks and at-risk groups, for mediation and grievance resolution.
    • Deliver capacity-building and vocational training for local organizations and at-risk groups to promote conflict mitigation, peacebuilding, and more effective and inclusive community mechanisms based on an appropriate conflict mapping and analytical study of specific localities.
• Intermediate Result 2: Citizens’ Participation in Good Governance Strengthened
  • PNG’s citizens and institutions are engaged in safeguarding democracy, human rights, and stability. The Applicant should use a bottom-up approach to build and reinforce the foundational skills needed to continue support for democracy, democratic principles, human rights, and participatory governance. This will be achieved through promoting meaningful participation of all citizens in their political, social and economic well-being, including women, youth, and other traditionally marginalized groups.
  • Sub-IR 2.1
    • Organizational and operational capacity of community-based and civil society organizations strengthened or established;
  • Sub-IR 2.2
    • Citizens’ participation and advocacy through community and local governance structures improved; and,
  • Sub-IR 2.3
    • Women and youth’s inputs into community decision-making increased.
  • Illustrative Activities:
    • Strengthening Community Governance Structures: Technical assistance to community-based organizations (CBOs) and CSOs to enhance their organizational and operational capacity. Help develop targeted institutions’ capacity to aggregate and respond to community needs and better carry out their functions. Technical assistance to build the capacity of community based organizations to carry out their mandates.
    • Enhancing Citizens’ Participation and Advocacy: Technical assistance to facilitate the establishment of linkages between community members and their governing officials. Help create opportunities for collaboration between local government entities and citizen groups – e.g. facilitating participatory planning and implementation of local development projects; encouraging periodic consultations between citizens and members of community governing bodies. This may include training and sensitization to enhance community members’ understanding of the basic principles of good governance and their roles and responsibilities in community governance processes, and building CSO/CBO advocacy skills.
• Intermediate Result 3: Sustainable and Equitable Livelihood Opportunities Improved
  • The Applicant will aim to improve equitable livelihood opportunities, and increase support for and investments in micro and small businesses, especially for women-owned enterprises. This will require increased access to financial resources and support, particularly for women-owned businesses.
  • Sub-IR 3.1
    • More sustainable and productive agriculture techniques introduced and adopted by communities.
  • Sub-IR 3.2
    • Alternative livelihood opportunities created or increased, especially for women.
  • Illustrative Activities:
    • Improve access to finance and credit for micro, and small enterprises, especially women-owned businesses.
    • Provide micro and small enterprise grants, and improve access to credit for micro-loans to support demand-driven local development activities that support women’s empowerment and youth inclusion.

Geographic Focus

• During project development consultations, local experts and stakeholders emphasized the need to focus on depth over breadth to maximize outcomes. The Applicant will therefore focus its initial efforts on two provinces – Hela and Morobe. These provinces were selected based on an assessment of local government political will and assessed opportunities to initiate, evidence success, and scale up intervention approaches to address identified conflict dynamics at the community level.

Eligibility Criteria

• The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in Papua New Guinea (PNG) is seeking applications for a Cooperative Agreement from qualified U.S. and Non-U.S. non-profit or for-profit Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), and other qualified non-U.S. organizations to implement a project entitled “USAID/Papua New Guinea Peace Project.”
• 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.
• Eligibility for this NOFO is not restricted.

For more information, visit Grants.gov.