ECREEE, CTCN and PFAN have launched a call for proposals for women-led sustainable energy enterprises in West-Africa, as part of the CTCN/ECOWAS Project on Mainstreaming Gender for a Climate-Resilient Energy System in West Africa. Women-led businesses employing clean energy solutions to facilitate women’s economic empowerment in the ECOWAS countries and seeking investments of up to USD 50 million are invited to apply by the 20th of November 2017.
At least 10 projects or businesses will be selected and receive coaching support from experienced professionals for the development of a financially, socially and environmentally sustainable business plan, which will play a crucial role in subsequent investor outreach. Upon the completion of the coaching phase, the projects will be introduced to interested investors, and receive follow-up support and deal-making facilitation. PFAN and CTCN will work closely with female-led climate and clean energy businesses in the ECOWAS region to leverage their expertise as agents of change.
The goal of this Call for Proposals is to facilitate the initiation and management of commercially viable energy projects by women entrepreneurs, and to provide the entrepreneurs with the technical, financial and other skills needed to be competitive as energy producers and suppliers. The ultimate aim of the Call is to further economic and social gender equality and enhance women’s resilience to the impacts of climate change.
Selected projects should contribute to women’s economic empowerment through productive uses of energy, by helping to increase the productivity levels of women in agricultural, commercial and tertiary practices through the increased use of renewable energy technologies; building the capacities of women and especially women farmers to use and maintain clean energy technologies; and raising awareness and educate the public on the use of renewable energy for poverty eradication at the household level and, more broadly, for rural development.
If you would like more detailed instructions or have questions about submitting a proposal, please join one of our PFAN Roadshows, to be held in several ECOWAS countries between the 13th and the 25th of October 2017.
Eligibility
This Call for Proposals is focused exclusively on gender mainstreaming. In order to be considered eligible, projects and / or businesses must be operating in the ECOWAS region in countries listed under Annex 1 and satisfy at least two of the following criteria:
Female entrepreneurs;
Significant proportion of female ownership;
Significant female representation in senior management;
Significant female representation throughout the workforce;
Significant benefits to women in economic, social and climate terms.
Businesses and projects with higher female proportions and representations across the above criteria and fulfilling multiple criteria will be considered more favourably.
Focus of Call for Proposals
The project / business must promote or use clean energy and climate technologies, products or services, including, but not limited to:
Proposals in the following technology areas:
| Biomass |
Distributed & Off-grid Generation |
| Biogas |
Energy Storage & Conservation |
| Bio-fuels |
Energy Efficiency and Demand Reduction |
| Solar |
Waste to Energy |
| Wind |
Emissions Reduction |
| Hydropower |
Clean Transport |
Submission of Applications andSupporting Material
All submissions are to be made online through PFAN’s Climate-Invest Management system. Applications sent via Email are not eligible.
In order to be considered, applicants must complete the following 3 steps:
- Registration through the online PFAN Climate-Invest Management System
- Completion of the online Application Form in the PFAN Climate-Invest Management System
- Submission of a Project Proposal and supporting documents through the online PFAN Climate-Invest Management System.
More detailed information about the process can be found in the Prospectus of the Call for Proposals
Please note the project proposal document to be uploaded should be in MS Word format, and should not exceed 20 pages including the cover page, contents, charts, and tables. Shorter documents are preferable to longer ones. Page setup, spacing, font size and type face are at your discretion but the document should be reader friendly. A maximum of 3 annexes may be used to provide additional information (e.g. the cash flow model in MS Excel format) provided that these do not exceed a further 10 pages of written information or the combined data volume limit. The total data volume of all files submitted to PFAN should not exceed 20 MB. PFAN reserves the right to not evaluate any proposals which exceed the data limit or the page limit.
To start, please register here: https://climate-invest.fluxx.io/apply/pfan_registration .
Applications must be submitted by 6 p.m. CET (Central European Time) on 20 November 2017 via https://climate-invest.fluxx.io/.
Participants selected to advance into the next round will be notified by 15 January 2018. Immediately following this notification, organizers will work with the selected participants to arrange the agreed coaching support for the next stage of the Initiative.
Disclaimer: PFAN is using Climate-Invest, a grant management portal to manage the PFAN project pipeline. However, PFAN does not provide any form of grant and offers technical assistance only.