Community Grants Program to Combat HIV/AIDS

The President’s Initiative
The President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief (PEPFAR) is a historic five-year $15 billion global program to provide treatment, prevention, and care for people living with or affected by HIV/AIDS.  In Uganda, the PEPFAR program is implemented by five U.S. Government agencies, which include the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Department of Defense, Department of State, Peace Corps and United States Agency for International Development. The PEPFAR program in Uganda aims to provide treatment to 70,000 people, avert 165,000 new HIV infections, and provide care and support to 325,000 individuals.

Community Grants Program
The Community Grants Program to Combat HIV/AIDS, which is funded by PEPFAR seeks to assist communities and grass root organizations with small-scale development projects to provide care and support to people living with HIV/AIDS (PHA) and orphans and vulnerable children (OVC).  Community Grants are not intended to fund private profit-making activities.

Community Grants fall into one of two categories:

1. Support for PHAs may include, but is not limited to projects that  fall into the following areas: 

• Clinical Care: is provided by nurses, midwives, clinical officers, community and volunteer health workers and physicians. It includes a wide range of treatment and care including, HIV testing and couselling, treatment of opportunistic infections, routine monitoring and anti-retroviral therapy.

• Psychological Care: family care and support groups, support for disclosure of HIV status, bereavement care and treatment of HIV-related psychiatric illnesses, such as depression and related anxieties, or related activity.

• Social Care: income generating activities, vocational training, nutrition, housing, efforts to reduce stigma, access to safe water and sanitation systems, or related activity.

• Prevention Care Services: prevention services designed to prevent transmission of HIV to others via prevention messages focused on disclosure, partner testing, correct and consistent condom use for PHA, or related activity.

2. Support for OVCs may include, but is not limited to projects that fall into  the following areas:

• Socio-economic Security: vocational training and income generating activities or related activity.

• Food Security and Nutrition: community gardens and school or soup kitchen feeding programs or related activity.

• Care and Support: shelter and increasing access to clean water or related.

• Mitigation of Impact of Conflict: counseling for conflict-affected children, child soldier demobilization programs, resettlement of conflict-affected and displaced children into non-conflict areas, or related activity.

• Education: promoting and creating access to early childhood, primary and secondary education to include construction of schools, payment of school fees, uniforms, and books, or related activity.

• Psychosocial Assistance: counseling HIV positive youth and OVCs suffering from anxiety, grief, trauma, developing programs to support counseling services, establishment of child friendly recreational facilities, or related activity.

• Health Care: programs that meet general health needs, age-appropriate HIV/AIDS prevention activities, malaria prevention, or related activity.

Community Grants Should:

• Address one or both of the two categories above.

• Improve basic conditions at the local, community, or village level.

• Be community driven.

• Permit quick implementation and impact. Projects should be completed within one year.

• Be conducted by legally registered Ugandan groups.

• Have measurable results. The project needs to be able to quantify and report on the number of PHAs and/or OVCs served with the funding received.

The Application Process
Applicants should explain how their proposal will benefit PHAs and OVCs. The project should address an immediate need and have a demonstrable impact on the quality of life of the target population.  Serious consideration will be given to groups that have submitted well-conceived proposals with realistic budgets.  Applications are due to the Small Grants Office by April 1.  To qualify for funding, a project must be able to measure how it contributes to PHAs and/or OVCs.  Additionally, each project accepted for funding must report its results twice a year (March 31 and September 30).  For example, an OVC care program might report that over the last year, 75 OVCs received food support, shelter, and healthcare.  These numbers reveal the work that the project has accomplished and demonstrate measurable results.

For the purpose of the Community Grants Program to Combat HIV/AIDS, orphans are children under age 18 with one or both parents deceased, whether to HIV/AIDS or other causes.  Vulnerable children are children under age 18 who are in circumstances that expose them to various dangers, such as economic, social and sexual exploitation.  The maximum grant award is $25,000.  Projects that are accepted will receive their first portion of funding in September.  Grant awards are disbursed in Ugandan shillings at the prevailing exchange rate on the day of payment.  Grants are awarded for a one year period. 
Selection Process

The Small Grants Coordinators conduct preliminary reviews and select a shortlist of applicants based on the following selection criteria:

• The target number of OVC and/or PHAs who will benefit from the funding;
• Technical merits of the application;
• Cost-effectiveness and cost-realism of the application; and
• Past performance of the applicant.

Preliminary reviews may include a site visit.  A shortlist is then presented to an internal review committee for final selection.  Applications which do not comply with the requirements of the program guidelines will not be considered. If your project is considered for funding, you will need to provide quotations from vendors for items to be purchased.  You must account for the funds you have spent by submitting receipts.

Contact Information
If your organization has a project that falls within the Community Grants Program guidelines, we encourage you to complete the application and send it to:

Small Grants Coordinator American Embassy
P.O. Box 7007
Kampala

In case of any questions, please contact the Small Grants Office, U.S. Embassy Kampala, tel: 0414-259-791 ext. 6421/6444/6141, fax: 0414-259-794, email: kampalapepfar@state.gov