Grants will be allocated via a competitive funding round, which will be coordinated by AusAID's Infrastructure and Water Policy Section (IWP) in Canberra. Proposals will be invited from both accredited and non-accredited Australian CSOs, as well as suitably experienced international CSOs (partnerships with national CSOs will be supported). Proposals will be assessed primarily on program quality and organisational capacity, with consideration also given to the need to achieve a balance of funding across regions.

Successful applicants will be required to implement activities over two phases. Firstly applicants will enter an inception phase of approximately four months during which time they will be required to further define and document their activity designs and implementation plans. A team of monitoring and evaluation experts will be responsible for producing document templates and will also provide technical assistance during the inception phase. The resulting products will form the scope of services for an agreement with AusAID for the four-year implementation phase of the activity (February 2013 - February 2017).

The Fund will resource a mix of water supply, sanitation and hygiene behaviour activities. AusAID will favour activities that place an emphasis on sanitation, which globally is tracking poorly against Millennium Development Goal target 7c: to halve, by 2015, the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation.  Furthermore, to be considered eligible both water and sanitation activities must have a hygiene component.

In addition to delivering water, sanitation and hygiene activities, each CSO will be expected to contribute to the evidence base on effective practice in WASH. Activities should monitor and report on the cost effectiveness of WASH approaches, the success factors and risks associated with innovative approaches and lessons learned from taking proven interventions to scale.

CSO contributions to the evidence base will be enhanced by a Knowledge and Learning Component, which will have three parts:

Grants for individual CSO programs are expected to be in the order of AUD$10 million across four years. The implementation period is expected to cover February 2013 to February 2017.

Note: CSOs will be resourced to participate in the inception phase. This will be considered a funded step towards signing of the full four year contract.

Interested organisations planning activities in a country where AusAID has a WASH program are encouraged to contact the relevant AusAID country or regional program area to discuss any potential points of complementarity between the proposed activity and the AusAID WASH program. 

Source and More Information: