Tuesday, February 14, 2012

CIDA launches the Canada Fund for African Climate Resilience



14 Feb 2012 11:21 Africa/Lagos

Call for Proposals: Canada Fund for African Climate Resilience

Objective of the Canada Fund for African Climate Resilience

The objective of the Canada Fund for African Climate Resilience (Canada Fund) is to support projects that will substantially improve and increase food security and/or economic growth within an African country by reducing the impacts of climate change through protection of investments and/or adaptation measures.

Review process

CIDA's Partnerships with Canadians Branch (PWCB) is launching a specialized call for proposals under a $20-million fund to support and rapidly address climate change effects and adaptation needs that are restricting or having negative impact on improving food security and/or economic growth in Africa.

This call will capitalize on Canadian expertise in addressing climate change effects and adaptation needs, as well as delivering sustainable, effective development projects in eligible developing countries in Africa. Proposals are to target achieving the objectives of the call. Proposals should also consider the opportunity to capture innovation to address critical climate change issues that require specialized expertise and technologies and integrated approaches. The proposals must be substantive in scope, self-sustaining once in operation, and achieve demonstrable results and outcomes.

A panel that will include experts in the fields of development, climate change, agriculture, and economic development will review all eligible proposals. The panel will make recommendations to the Minister for International Cooperation for final approval.

Funding will be provided in the form of a grant or a contribution and will be based on a cost-share basis, up to 85 percent CIDA and 15 percent the partner, calculated on project costs. The partner's 15 percent cost-share contribution is a baseline; a higher contribution by the partner will be factored in the proposal assessment. The level of investment (cash versus in-kind contribution) will also be considered when assessing proposals for sustainability. Only substantive projects with a minimum budget of $2 million will be considered; all projects will be subject to an evaluation against results and outputs proposed.

Eligible private sector or civil society applicants, or their coalitions, may submit up to two proposals. Each proposal will be for a project implemented in only one country among the following eligible countries in Africa:

  • CIDA countries of focus: Ethiopia, Ghana, Mali, Mozambique, Senegal, Tanzania
  • Other eligible countries: Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Zambia

The deadline for submission is noon (12:00), Pacific Standard Time, April 19, 2012.

Applicants may refer to the document Examples of country-level climate-resilient development activities that could be supported under the Canada Fund.

Eligibility

In addition to the regular eligibility requirements, in order to receive support under the Canada Fund, a project must:
  • Be completed by March 31, 2014 (approximately 18 months for implementation)
  • Be implemented in one of the 14 eligible African countries
  • Align with one or more of the priority programming areas in Canada's policy framework on public climate finance, namely,
    • Adaptation by the poorest and most vulnerable
    • Clean energy
    • Forests and agriculture
  • Advance programming that builds upon existing programming and/or scales up the demonstrated capacity, expertise, technology, and value-added of the Canadian private sector and/or civil society in vulnerable and under-served communities by working in partnership with developing country partners

Given the short timeframe for project implementation, proposals that require an environmental assessment will not be recommended. Please read Section 8.2.2 of the application guidelines carefully to determine whether your proposal triggers the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. If it does, it is expected that you either already have had an environmental assessment done by a competent authority for the proposed physical works or that you plan to have one done, at your organization's expense, and accepted by CIDA's environmental specialist before signing an agreement with CIDA.

Canadian organizations or coalitions may submit proposals on the following basis:
  • The lead applicant and its supporting members must be incorporated in Canada
  • The regularly appointed board of directors, board of governors or any other governance structure of the lead applicant must have a majority of Canadian members

The lead applicant, or, if a Canadian coalition, at least one of the supporting members, must be able to demonstrate that it has five years of recent experience in Africa working with CIDA, another department of the Government of Canada, or any other bilateral aid agency or multilateral development institution.

Application process

  1. Please review the Canada Fund application form, application guidelines, and related documents thoroughly.
  2. Create or update the lead applicant's profile through Partners@CIDA.
  3. Confirm the lead applicant's eligibility for this call by performing an eligibility self-assessment.
  4. Upload the mandatory documents as listed in thesupporting documentation checklist together with the application form to your profile on Partners@CIDA. Supporting documentation that is not available in an electronic format should be scanned and uploaded to Partners@CIDA. PWCB will not accept application forms or supporting documentation sent by mail or by fax. Only complete application packages (that is, packages comprising a complete application form and all the required supporting documentation, signed by a duly authorized representative of the lead applicant or the Canadian partnership group, where indicated) will be considered.
  5. Submit your application before the deadline.

Key documents

If you cannot access the alternate formats, consult the Help page.

Deadline

Completed applications must be submitted by noon, Pacific standard time, on April 19, 2012. No late applications will be accepted.

You will be sent an automatic email to confirm that your application has been received. If you do not receive the email, then consider the application "not received".

Proposal assessment

CIDA will assess all proposals submitted with all mandatory documents against the following five partnership principles:
  • Sound governance
  • Support of Canadians
  • Relevance to CIDA's mandate and coherence with Canadian government policy
  • Results
  • Development effectiveness

These partnership principles are defined further in the application guidelines.

To ensure transparency and fairness to all applicants, CIDA will not discuss proposal submissions until all applicants have been notified of decisions regarding their proposals. The application guidelines and the Frequently Asked Questions section of the CIDA-PWCB website represent the only official interpretation of the application process.

Applicants that do not meet the eligibility criteria as outlined in the section on eligibility will be notified in writing as soon as possible. All other applicants will be notified in writing of the call results in due course.





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