Project support to civil society organisations
The Ministry for Foreign Affairs grants discretionary government transfers to Finnish civil society organisations (CSOs) and municipalities for their development cooperation projects. Calls for proposals are opened every two years. The call for proposals is open between 31 January - 31 March 2020.
- Principles of support
- Tuen periaatteet
- Call for proposals 2021-2024
- Conditions and guidelines of project support
- Forms for e-Service
- Basic information form
- Application forms for project support
- Disbursement commitment and request
- Change of use application and complementary information
- Reporting
Principles of support
Project support for Finnish NGOs is an important form of civil society development cooperation and part of Finland's development policy implementation. The development cooperation projects of NGOs increase the diversity and impact of Finnish development cooperation in their own fields of expertise and with their own operating practices in developing countries around the world. According to the Guidelines for Civil Society in Development Policy (2017), strengthening civil society is both a development policy objective and a means to promote Finland's other development policy objectives and the goals of the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Project support also promotes Finland's foreign policy objectives, such as the implementation of human rights policy objectives.
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Call for proposals 2021-2024
Call for proposals and application criteria
Questions and answers (note: the answers are in the language the questions were received in)
List of projects to which support was granted in the call for proposals in 2020
Conditions and guidelines of project support
General conditions for the use of discretionary government transfers granted by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and complementary conditions for project support:
Forms for e-Service
Ministry for Foreign Affairs uses an e-Service and its electronic forms for the administration of project support. Find out about the e-Service.
To download the forms you will need to have the latest version of the free Adobe Reader software.
Save the forms on your own work station before opening them (Save target as). You can edit, save or forward forms to others before you submit the application.
Basic information form
Grant recipients will need to submit the basic information form annually together with the following appendices: action plan, budget proposal, annual report, financial statement, audit report and other possible documents, such as revised rules and extract from the register of associations.
The basic information form will be submitted only once also in cases where the actor is applying for several discretionary government transfers in the same year.
Applicants for grants must use the code given in the acknowledgement of receipt to be able to submit new applications for project support in application cycles. It is requested that applicants will submit their basic information forms by the end of April.
After submitting the basic information form, you will receive a notification on your electronic user account, which includes the case ID code (which is in the form of UHA20XX-000XXX). Write this ID code under section 2.1 of the project support application or continuation project application.
- Basic information form (UML2017-0012.1.11)
Application forms for project support
- Application form (UML2020-0013.2.1)
- Filling instructions for the application form
Mandatory appendices:
- Description of project (max. 7 pages)
- Memorandum of Understanding
- Mandatory assurance (in Finnish)
Please note that when you name the appendices, special characters (such as , . - / ä ö) must not be used. When you save appendices, make sure that the file format is also saved (for example action_plan_2013.pdf). The total size of the appendices may not exceed 10 MB.
Additional instructions:
- DAC Purpose Codes
- DAC Goals
- Guidance note for statistics
- SMART-indicators
- Theories of Change and Aggregate Indicators for Finland's Development Policy 2020
Disbursement commitment and request
Commitment form, to be submitted before the receipt of government support:
- Commitment in Finnish (UML2016-0017.2.3)
Disbursement request form.
- Payment request of discretionary government transfer (UML2015-0018.1.2)
Account of the project status form, to be used when the first instalment is requested to be paid before the annual report is submitted (by 30 April):
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Account of the project in Finnish
Commitments and disbursement requests are attached to the data concerning the grant recipient and the project using the case ID in the e-Service. The ID is in the form of year-month-day-0000XXXX.
Change of use application and complementary information
Prepare the applications concerning change of use of appropriated funds and carry-over to the next year using the form below.
- Change of use application (UML2017-0016.2.2)
Additional information to the basic information form, project application and annual report is given using the form below.
- Complementary information form (UML2018-0024.1.2)
Reporting
Organisations report on their use of the granted discretionary government transfers via the Foreign Ministry's e-Service. The reports must be submitted by 30 April.
The appendices to the annual reports are also sent electronically only. Appendices that must be signed are scanned and appended to the electronic reporting form.
- Form for annual reporting of project support (UML2018-0019.1.6)
- Filling instructions concerning the form for annual reporting of project support
The ID data required for filling in the reporting form can be retrieved from the organisation's electronic user account, project support applications and the decision on discretionary government support as well as from the changes of use if any.