Up to $130,000 Grant for Strengthening Feminist Women’s Rights Movements

Deadline: 26-Jul-24

UN Women has announced a call for proposals for women’s rights organizations, networks or coalitions operating at regional/multi-country/sub-region operations in East and Southern Africa for the Programme ”Advocacy Coalition Building and Transformative Feminist Action to End Violence Against Women’‘ to facilitate annual reviews on accountability, monitoring and reporting of progress on the GBV Action Coalition and related AC Commitments in Africa for strengthening collective and evidence-based advocacy

The Advocacy, Coalition Building and Transformative Feminist Action to End Violence Against Women (ACT) programme, a partnership between the European Commission and UN Women as co-leaders of the Generation Equality Action Coalition on Gender Based Violence (AC GBV), is working to accelerate progress to end VAWG. Operating at global and regional levels, with an initial focus in Africa and Latin America, it is supporting and investing in strong and empowered feminist women’s rights organizations at regional levels and in building coalitions with multiple stakeholders and actors from all sectors to strengthen regional advocacy to end VAWG.

Funding Information

The maximum budget for this Call is $130,000.

Timeframe

Detailed timeline spanning 22 months, (9 September 2024 to 7 July 2026) with activities aligned to a budget and the requirements as per the TOR.

Services Required/Results

The ACT Programme aims to contribute to:
- Outcome 1: Strengthened coalition building, networking, leadership, and resilience of global and regional feminist women’s rights movements, where.
  - Output 1.1: Strategic planning, organizational, technical, and financial capacities of feminist women’s rights coalitions at the global and regional levels are strengthened.
  - Output 1.2: Women’s rights organizations and/or coalitions have strengthened capacities to collect and use knowledge, research, and data including practice- based learning; and
  - Output 1.3: Women’s rights organizations and coalitions have strengthened access to resources and spaces for feminist networking, knowledge sharing, strategizing, collaboration, and coalition building to ending violence against women.
- Outcome 2: Increased and enhanced advocacy, campaigning, and policymaking to end violence against women and girls (EVAW) through multi-stakeholder partnerships and coalitions, where:
  - Output 2.1: Impact oriented EVAW initiatives and advocacy actions at regional and global level led by women’s rights movements and multistakeholder coalitions are implemented.
  - Output 2.2: Enhanced evidence-base for EVAW advocacy, campaigning monitoring and policy making, campaigning.
  - Output 2.3: Representation and participation of women’s rights organizations and coalitions (including intersectional groups) in formal global and/or regional fora is enhanced and supported.
In support of these results, specifically Output 2.1: Impact oriented EVAW initiatives and advocacy actions at regional and global level led by women’s rights movements and multistakeholder coalitions are implemented.’ UN Women seeks to engage an AC GBV member(s) in East and Southern Africa to facilitate actions to enhance accountability and promote awareness of progress on the Action Coalition on GBV and related Action Coalition Commitments in Africa, including through the use of annual monitoring and reporting mechanisms for strengthening collective and evidence-based advocacy in line with the objectives above. This will help AC GBV members across the region to review member states’ accountability on the progress against their commitments under the GBV Action Coalition in Africa. The partnership will promote monitoring and reporting of progress on the AC GBV in strengthening collective and evidence -based advocacy.
Through the partnership, UN Women will collaborate with an AC GBV member operating in East and Southern Africa to contribute to Output 2.1 as explained below.
- Outcome 2:
  - Increased and enhanced advocacy, campaigning, and policymaking to end violence against women and girls (EVAW) through multi-stakeholder partnerships and coalitions.
    - Coordinate impact-oriented EVAWG initiatives and advocacy actions at the regional level led by women’s rights movements and multistakeholder coalitions in the region, including public-private collaborations.
      - Engage commitment-makers under AC GBV across East and Southern Africa region (ESAR) and strengthen organizational and collective capacity in policymaking, campaigning and advocacy for improved state accountability on EVAWG.
      - Identify existing platforms for exchange and facilitate spaces (virtual and physical) for networking among AC GBV commitment makers in ESAR.
      - Support AC GBV commitment-makers to contribute into the Generation Equality annual accountability report and share progress with members regionally.

Eligible Countries

Angola, Burundi, Botswana, Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Eswatini Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Rwanda, Seychelles, Somalia, South Africa, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Zambia.

Competencies

Technical/functional competencies required by submitting organization:
- The organization, network, coalition or consortium must have the following functional/technical competencies:
- Prior experience in coalition-building or collective advocacy for ending violence against women and girls;
- Experience working with diverse partners, including marginalized groups and multiple stakeholders; and existing relationships with feminist organizations, allies, networks, regional or sub-regional bodies, and other relevant stakeholders;
- A strong understanding of potential opportunities, challenges and strategies on ending violence against women and girls (EVAWG) in East and Southern Africa and an ability to engage in diverse political environments;
- An in-depth understanding of various EVAWG commitments and advocacy processes and platforms for advancing gender equality in the region;
- A robust monitoring and evaluation system, participatory monitoring and evaluation mechanisms to measure the effectiveness of gender equality interventions and ability to adapt approaches as needed.
Organizational: CSO Criteria
- The eligible organization should also meet the legal, programmatic, and technical criteria defined below:
  - Be a women’s rights organization, network, or coalition organization, with organizations led by women or young women in all their diversity considered as an asset.
  - Be a commitment-maker or leader in the Action Coalition on GBV operating in East and Southern Africa (organizations with programmatic focus on only one country must demonstrate they have experience and networks to coordinate actions at a sub-regional level)
  - Duly registered under the laws of the country of operation with the East and Southern African region and legally authorised to operate.
  - Gender equality must be a demonstrated priority area of work for the organization.
  - Operating for at least five years with demonstrated programmatic experience related to institutional strengthening of women’s rights organizations and networks, advocacy, or advancing efforts to ending violence against women and girls and promote gender equality more broadly. Organizations operating for three years can be accepted with evidence of strong experience in the areas above.
Other competencies, which while not required, can be an asset for the performance of services:
- Experience working with United Nations will be an added advantage
- Demonstrated experience working on intersectional approaches will be an added advantage