Background

The Voices for Climate Action (VCA) program is a lobby and advocacy program being implemented by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) Netherlands, SouthSouthNorth (SSN), Akina Mama wa Afrika (AMwA), Slum Dwellers International (SDI), Fundación Avina and Hivos under the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ five-year strategic partnership: “Power of Voices”.

The program aims to ensure that by 2025, local civil society and underrepresented groups will have taken on a central role as creators, facilitators and advocates of innovative and inclusive climate solutions. Their inclusion is crucial for effective and lasting climate responses. It is also crucial, because the climate crisis is also a societal challenge with ethical and human rights aspects occurring alongside a number of inequalities based on gender, socioeconomic class, race, ethnicity, nationality, ability, sexual orientation, and age.

The overall approach of the program is to work with civil society to build widespread societal support for locally shaped climate solutions through an inclusive and rights-based approach. This includes building a broad-based climate alliance at country level, bridging divides (urban-rural, gender, youth) that amplifies voices in new unusual ways. In addition, it will influence national and global policies and financial flows (e.g. climate finance, private sector investments) in support of these locally shaped solutions.

Climate justice approach

Climate change is essentially a human rights issue because of its devastating effect on human life – and rights. It exacerbates existing inequalities between rich and poor, ethnicities, sexes, generations and communities. It undermines democracy and threatens the economy and development at large. Likewise, by far the greatest burden falls on those already in poverty and on underrepresented groups such as Indigenous peoples, the rural and urban poor, women and youth, although they are the least responsible for climate change. Through a climate justice approach, the program intends to see an expanded civic space where civil society voices, in particular those of indigenous and/or marginalized people are heard on climate action.

Main strategic interventions

The programs main strategic interventions are centred around the following three pillars

• Mutual capacity strengthening for co-creating alternative scaled climate solutions
• Agenda setting and movement in climate action through amplified storytelling
• Joint lobbying and advocacy to make policy and financial flows responsive to locally shaped climate solutions

This program is being implemented in Kenya by consortium members AMwA, Hivos, SDI, SSN and WWF. We are seeking partners for the program to join forces with us to amplify and strengthen voices for the achievement of the program goals, with strategies focused around any of the main interventions as outlined above. Please read on for the specifics of this particular call.

• Region: Kenya
• Office: Hivos East Africa
• Application deadline: June 30th, 2023

Guidelines for grant applicants

Hivos is looking to partner with Kenyan civil society organizations that will contribute to the goals of the program in different ways. We are looking for organizations that can present an exciting, innovative program that will contribute to amplifying marginalized voices and stories by citizens, enhancing public participation and action in climate policy and budget processes and contributing to policy and financing change that will lead to enhanced climate action at local, national and global levels. This program will not support any ‘hardware’ or ‘implementation’ projects.

Hivos also intends to support organizations to collaborate in coalitions to achieve these goals. This will be done over the time period of 2021-2025. The first phase began in July 2021 and ended in December 2022. This phase will begin in August 2023 and end in April 2025. Please read on for details of each specific grant. More information about the coalition and organisation requirements can be found below in the FAQs.

Campaign/movement grant: for an organization or coalition (two or more organizations)

Hivos seeks to partner with organizations aligned with the goals of the program, which are involved in existing climate movements in Kenya. Of key interest are movements led by youth, women, Indigenous people, or other marginalized groups. This grant will focus on strengthening the movement to achieve its goals through supporting campaigns spearheaded by the movement, and any capacity development the organization might need. If applying as a coalition, one organization must be designated the lead in the application. The lead organization should also be able to demonstrate in assessments if shortlisted, institutional capability to manage sub-granting to the other organisations in the coalition.

This grant will last for an initial period of approximately a year and a half from January 2024 to April 2025. Budget: EUR 90, 000.

Indigenous organizations grant: for a coalition (three or more organizations)

This grant will support a group of organizations representing the specific concerns and perspectives of Indigenous people and communities in Kenya. The coalition will create a program in any combination of the program pillars related to climate action. The coalition must consist of at least three organizations, and one organization must be designated the lead organization. The lead organization should also be able to demonstrate in assessments if shortlisted, institutional capability to manage sub-granting to the other organisations in the coalition. This program must include an element of policy/budget influencing and can operate at either sub-national or national level, or both. If operating at sub-national level please indicate the counties you intend to work in.

The program pillars are:

• Mutual capacity strengthening for co-creating alternative scaled climate solutions
• Agenda setting and movement in climate action through amplified storytelling
• Joint lobbying and advocacy to make policy and financial flows responsible to locally shaped climate solutions

This grant will last for an initial period of approximately a year and 4 months from January 2024 to April 2025. Budget: EUR 70, 000.

Media fellowship or storytelling grant – for an organization or coalition (two or more organizations)

Hivos seeks to partner with Kenyan organizations active in the media space to see an increase in both stories of inspiring climate action in the media, and more citizen stories being amplified for the public. Your organization should have experience in facilitating storytelling sessions with communities and citizens with tangible outputs, and/or experience implementing media trainings and fellowships, as well as using stories for influencing at local and national level. If applying as a coalition, one organization must be designated the lead in the application.

This grant will last for an initial period of approximately a year and 4 months from September 2023 to December 2024. Budget: EUR 90, 000.

Organisational eligibility

• Locally registered non-profit Kenyan organization with an operational bank account in the applicant’s name
• For coalitions, the lead must fulfil the eligibility criteria. It is not required for other members of the coalitions to be registered organizations.
• Organizations must have a clean human rights record
• Applicant with the ability to link to and mobilize larger networks or capacity to access, mobilise, convene, and influence power holders
• It will be considered favorable if the coalitions/organizations:
  • Have prior experience in lobby and advocacy, capacity strengthening, movement building, storytelling, or collaborating closely with and representing marginalized groups including but not limited to Indigenous people, women and girls, youth, and people with disabilities.
  • For coalitions, the inclusion of actors not traditionally working in climate justice issues, but that have skills and tools which are relevant and/or scalable is a plus; especially as lead organisations
  • Willing to collaborate with other organisations within and outside the program for increased impact

Not eligible:

• International organizations

Application procedure

Applications should be in English

The concepts must be no more than 12 pages with the following sections:

Applicant(s) information

• Date of application
• List of organization(s) applying for the call and a summarised organizational profile for each organization
• Name of the entity and representative that will sign the agreement if the grant is awarded (lead)
• Name of program
• Grant you are applying for

Narrative of program and budget

• Your proposed program and approaches within the program, related to the program pillars detailed above. Description of the activities that will be undertaken using this grant. Try to be as concrete as possible: detail which regions you will be working in, what entities you will be targeting and how you will implement activities that will support the achievement of your goals within the confines of this program
• Objectives or proposed outcomes of your activities; and the change you aim to achieve through your program
• For the media call, submit a work plan that briefly outlines proposed activities, including a simple schedule, a time frame for activities for a period of 15 months (activity planning should end November 2024), and a summary budget per activity/result – can be attached as an annex. If applying as a coalition, detail which organizations are involved in which components, also indicate when activities are joint

Send applications as a single PDF document to GrantsEA@hivos.org by COB June 30th, 2023. In the subject line, please put the appropriate subject as follows:

• VCA Movement – for the campaign/movement grant
• VCA Climate – for the climate action/justice grant
• VCA IP – for the Indigenous organizations grant
• VCA Media – for the media/storytelling grant

Information session

Hivos will hold a Q&A session on Thursday 9th June at 2 PM to 3:30 PM to allow interested parties to ask questions on any of the above directly. If you’re interested, register for this webinar at this link. You will receive a confirmation email containing links about how to join the webinar.

Any other questions should be directed to GrantsEA@hivos.org with the subject: VCA Query

FAQ

Can I apply for multiple grants to the same organization if my organization qualifies in more than one category?
Yes you can; however at the shortlisting stage if you are shortlisted for more than one grant (where applicable), you will have to select which grant to go forward with

Can I apply for grants with more than one organization under this call?
Yes; you can apply for grants with any number of the four organizations. However, once each organization conducts shortlisting; you will be asked to select which grant best suits your organizational approach and priorities.

If I am not a lead coalition member, can I apply for a grant with another organisation as well (applies to those in coalitions)?
Similar to the previous response, at the application stage you can apply for grants with any number of the three organizations. However, once each organization conducts shortlisting; you will be asked to select which grant best suits your organizational approach and priorities. Should you choose to withdraw from the consortium in such a case, the consortium will be asked to revise their proposal.

What are the registration requirements for lead and non-lead organizations applying as a coalition?
If you are applying as the lead member, your organization must be formally registered. If you are not the lead, you should be able to demonstrate your operating modalities. In addition, the coalition must be prepared when shortlisted to demonstrate how the coalition will operate within this program, and to have an agreement between the organisations on the same.

Why are the contract periods different between organizations?
The program is being implemented for five years; however the organizations have different processes and procedures. The contract period signifies how long the initial contract will last. But AMwA, Hivos and WWF will all be working with partners over the full duration of the program, so this should not be an area of concern.

How should the proposal address the various effects of the pandemic?
Covid-19 has affected how civil society organizations work in a number of ways and in Kenya, it has largely been a challenge. When you are drafting your proposal and budget, please be cognizant of these various challenges and aim to submit a proposal that is able to be implemented by taking into account various safety and containment measures that are in place now or may be affected in the future.