JULY 2024 – DIGITAL AND GREEN INNOVATION ACTION - CALL FOR PROPOSALS ON DIGITAL AND GREEN INNOVATIONS IN AFRICA

Is this Call for Proposals for you?   

Important and useful information to guide you in your application and increase the chances of your proposal being selected are displayed in details in the Guidelines, that you will find below and on the SUBMIT page. Hereafter, we give you a quick overview of what their contents. 

What is the objective of the Call ? 

This Call for Proposals will identify and support digital and green innovations (DGIs) that are ready to or transitioning to scale.

Support will be given in the form of grants, specific technical support and capacity building activities

Who can apply ?

The Call targets public institutions and private not-for-profit actors such as academia, Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and/or Social Enterprises.

To be eligible the applicant must satisfy the following conditions: 1. be a legal person 2. to be a public actor or a private non-profit actor 3. to be directly responsible for the preparation and management of the action with the co-applicant(s) and not be acting as an intermediary 4. have already managed a grant (of public funds) amounting to 40% of the amount applied for.

This Call for proposals is open for the 13 partner countries of the Belgian development cooperation in Africa: Niger, Senegal, Morocco, Mali, Burkina Faso, Benin, Guinea-Conakry, Mozambique, Burundi, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda and Democratic Republic of Congo.

What kind of innovation fits into this Call ?

The jury will evaluate innovations on three main criteria: the innovative aspect, the scaling aspect, and the green aspect. 

Innovation : 

To verify whether a solution qualifies as an innovation, Enabel adheres to the following three criteria: 

1. The solution must be new or novel in the specific context, and at least ‘new’ or ‘novel’ to the intended end-users;

2. The solution must aim at transformative impact (beyond mere improvements or efficiency gains); 

3. The solution is still to be developed, tested, adapted, adopted or scaled, hence the solution has not yet reached its  optimal sustainable scale.

Scaling

The Call for Proposals specifically aims to identify innovations which have a proof of concept, are transitioning to scale or are already in the phase of scaling. In other words, to qualify for submission, proposed solutions must have already passed the early stages of ideation, prototyping and testing.

Wehubit grants support scaling in terms of expansion. Expansion can be understood as geographical scope (implementation in new areas), users/beneficiaries (more or different users/beneficiaries), and/or services (development of what the innovation entails and offers).

Digital and green

Digital and green innovations (DGIs) are defined as solutions that leverage digital tools and/or technologies to contribute positively to at least one of the following environmental objectives: climate adaptation, resilience, mitigation, protection and restoration of biodiversity and ecosystems, sustainable use and protection of water and maritime resources, environment and water resources, pollution prevention and reduction, resource efficiency and systemic shifts like the circular economy.

Digital tools and technologies are not seen as an objective but a way to tackle societal challenges and achieve sustainable social and economic impact, within planetary boundaries.

This Call for Proposals will pay specific attention to those DGIs that are aligned with the thematic priorities defined by Enabel and its implementing partners under DGI Joint Action, and the thematic scope of Enabel Country Portfolios (that are to be found in Annex J of the Guidelines). 

The thematic priorities of Enabel and its partners are the following :

• Climate-Smart agriculture and sustainable food systems

• Resilient cities and sustainable urban planning

• Water management/floods prevention

• Circular economy and e-waste management

• Sustainable, affordable and clean energy

Duration and Budget

The total indicative sum available for Enabel’s Call for Proposals is 750.000 EUR. Projects can request a minimum of EUR 100.000 and a maximum of EUR 150.000, for implementation of 12 to 14 months.

How to apply?

If you are interested in applying for a grant, we invite you to download the Guidelines and carefully read all the information regarding the process. This document contain all the necessary information and instructions to be followed for submitting your project. 

If you feel that your project is in line with the Guidelines, please go to the online application form and click on the 'APPLY' button.

Within this application form you will be asked to answer questions and upload the required documents (see Guidelines). Templates are provided within the webform.

Applicants must ensure that their forms and annexes are complete. Incomplete applications will be rejected.

Tips to improve your chances

The jury is not yet replaced by artificial intelligence. Its members are still working with human brains. Make their life easy by being straight and to the point in your answers.

The grant is funded by public money. You are not allowed to identify upfront in your proposal who you will work with unless it is a co-applicant, or a partner (which implies no money transfer). While implementing your project, you will have to look for service and goods providers: apply transparent and competitive selection procedures during implementation.