Global Forest Watch (GFW) Small Grants Fund 2016: International NGOs can get Funds of up to $40,000 USD for their Conservation Projects

Deadline: 15 February 2016

The Global Forest Watch is currently accepting proposals for its Small Grants Fund (SGF) 2016 to promote broad uptake and innovative use of GFW by civil society around the world. Applicants must submit a proposal explaining how they would like to apply GFW data and technology to enhance their organization’s work, including, but not limited to, advocacy, campaigning, journalism, research, community forest management, and conservation projects.

Successful applicants will receive financial and technical support from GFW to implement their proposal.

Global Forest Watch (GFW) is a free, online forest monitoring and alert system that provides timely and actionable information to support sustainable management and conservation of forest landscapes. GFW data and tools have been used by journalists and civil society organizations around the world to conduct advocacy, launch campaigns, and strengthen local forest management and law enforcement activities on the ground.

Grant Criteria

The SGF awards organizations between $10,000 and $40,000 USD
The number of projects awarded ranges from 10-15
The total annual funding available is $375,000 USD
Trainings and technical assistance are provided throughout the grant cycle, which lasts from April-December
Successful projects seek to translate information into action, applying GFW to overcome challenges in protecting the world’s forests.

Funding Areas

Projects may include, but are not limited to:

Forest management, monitoring and law enforcement – Use GFW’s near real-time alerts to monitor deforestation, notify authorities, target ranger patrols, or guide legal investigations.
Advocacy / campaigning – Use GFW data to generate evidence to campaign against illegal deforestation, land grabbing, and environmental injustice.
Journalism and storytelling – Raise public awareness about the threats to forests and forest-dependent communities by publishing stories or training local journalists using GFW data.
Data collection or generation – Contribute to GFW’s mission to increase forest transparency by promoting disclosure of geospatial data, aggregating and surfacing existing forest data, or developing new geospatial data, and making it publicly available.
Scientific or policy research – Use GFW data to generate original research or analysis discerning spatial or temporal trends in land use, forest change or drivers of deforestation to make forest policy recommendations.
Education and training / capacity building – Design training modules and create materials to further the understanding of how GFW can be used.

Eligibility Criteria

In order to be eligible, organizations must:
- Be certified non-profit and non-governmental;
- Implement projects at a regional, national or sub-national level;
- Have an annual budget greater than $30,000 USD;
- Possess a computerized financial system for tracking and recording expenses;
- Perform an annual audit (NOTE: all grant recipients are required to undergo a grant-specific audit at the end of the project. GFW will cover the cost of this audit).
- Be able to fill out an organizational assessment document (containing questions regarding organization finances) in fluent English.
The Small Grants Fund seeks applications for projects that clearly demonstrate how the organization intends to use Global Forest Watch to enhance achievement of their organizational objectives mentioned above.
Previous unsuccessful applicants are encouraged to apply. Previous winners are not eligible.
Special considerations will be given to projects that:
- promote gender equity or benefit women
- support social justice or poverty reduction
- are from forest-rich, resource-constrained countries that have been geographically underrepresented in past cycle applicant pools (currently African countries)

How to Apply

The application contains three sections: basic information, financial information, and project information. You will also be required to upload a project budget, using a template that will be provided to you via the application software.

2016 Timeline