Tips for Applying to the US Embassy Program, Mozambique

The US Embassy just opened a call for proposals in Mozambique for proposals on social marginalization. It wants to address the problem, that many young men and women living in the districts of Palma, Nangade, Mocímboa da Praia, and Macomia view themselves as socially marginalized.

If your NGO works in one of these districts in the field of combatting social marginalization, you can submit a proposal until the deadline of 27^th of July 2018. The grant amount is between $5000 and $25000. In this article, we give you some tips to prepare your proposal for this opportunity.

Who can apply?

Organizations that want to apply need to be registered non-profit organizations in Mozambique. If an international organization wants to apply, they need to have registered offices in Mozambique. With the application you need to submit your registration documents, so they need to be in order.

What does the Embassy want to see in your application?

The US embassy has very strict rules that you should follow when applying for this opportunity. Proposals who do not follow exactly the guidelines will not be considered.

The proposal should consist of the following parts and you should follow the word count as exactly as possible. Never write more than the stated maximum amount of words.

• Title (10 words or less);
• Name of the organization;
• Description of organization (100 words or less);
• Point of contact in the organization;
• A problem statement (provided);
• Description of the primary target audience (200 words or less);
• Description of the behavioral objective for the primary target audience (200 words or less);
• Description of activity or activities (300 words or less);
• Project timeline
• Monitoring and Evaluation Plan
• Long-term sustainability of the project
• Itemized budget in U.S. dollars.

On the homepage of the Embassy, you can find very detailed tips on what to include in each of these sections. Here I will just emphasize a couple of very important points.

Always stay to the point and be very precise. You have very little words to describe what you want to do, so use them wisely. The Embassy wants you to describe only one objective and one target group. They provide the problem statement for you (“Many young men and women living in the districts of Palma, Nangade, Mocímboa da Praia, and Macomia view themselves as socially marginalized.”), and they want you to use exactly this wording. There is no need for you to write a complete project background, as the Embassy defined the exact problem for you.

What will be the evaluation criteria for your proposal?

The Embassy states that they will evaluate your application by looking at the following criteria:

• Adherence to the required format;
• Appropriateness of primary target audience;
• Applicability of behavioural objective to problem statement;
• Track record of the organization;
• Cost-effectiveness;  and
• Geographic preference: the districts of Palma, Nangade, Mocímboa da Praia, and Macomia.

As you can see, the adherence to the guidelines is stated again, because it is of utmost importance. You can find more information about this opportunity and the email address that you have to use for your submission on the homepage of the US embassy. Best of luck!