Human Development Innovation Fund (HDIF) for African Entrepreneurs 2017

The Human Development Innovation Fund (HDIF) is now accepting funding applications for pilot and scale-up projects between £500,000 and £1,000,000 (exceptions can be made for compelling applications for a grant not lower than GBP 200,000).

Application Deadline: 8th September 2017

To Be Taken At (Country): Tanzania

About the Award: The Human Development Innovation Fund (HDIF) has now opened its 3rd round of funding to find innovative and sustainable solutions to create social impact in education, health and WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene) across Tanzania. The fund is part of an overall £39.5 million investment ininnovation in Tanzania by UK Aid.

In this round, HDIF seeks to fund organizations to implement innovative pilot and scale up projects in WASH and Early Childhood Development (ECD), as detailed under the following challenge statements.

Early Childhood Development (ECD) – To improve opportunities for ECD for vulnerable children aged 0-6 that will improve children’s readiness and receptiveness to learning, and improve their general health and well-being.

Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) – To increase demand, uptake and sustainability of improved sanitation facilities, hand washing with soap at critical times and menstrual hygiene management, through innovative financing mechanisms, technology, and behaviour change promotion.

Type: Entrepreneurship

Eligibility: HDIF funds non-state actors and specifically encourages applications from the private sector, including, but not limited to, private-for-profit organisations, social entrepreneurs, and other nonstate actors either involved or interested in the delivery of quality pro-poor services.

Applicants who demonstrate their commitment to sustainability with counter-part or match funding will be considered favourably.

An applicant for HDIF funding is an organisation that:

• Is not afraid of challenging the status quo.
• Can demonstrate the use of new models of service delivery, whilst working with and developing new technologies and techniques.
• Can demonstrate sustainability and the ability to scale-up innovations.
• Understands the need to and actively shares knowledge with the wider community.

Selection Criteria: Each HDIF funded project must satisfy the funding round’s eligibility criteria and will be scored against other applications based on 5 selection criteria:

• Innovation: HDIF defines ‘innovation’ as an approach, idea, technology or service delivery method that is new to Tanzania and/or the world, or offers an improvement or scaling up. HDIF has adapted Doblin’s 10 Types of Innovation (https://www.doblin.com/ten-types) as a framework for the classifying supported innovations.
• Developmental impact: HDIF will evaluate how your proposed project could contribute to the objectives of HDIF and create meaningful benefits for large numbers of the poor, children under five, women and girls, and the vulnerable.
• Viability: HDIF assesses the potential viability and sustainability of the innovation and the potential for larger systems change. For any innovation to have higher chances of being sustainable, it should have the following aspects:
  • Affordability: being cheap enough for people to be able to buy or gain access to (and profitable enough to produce).
  • Maintainability: a measure of the ease and rapidity with which a system or equipment or approach can be restored to operational status following a failure. Maintainability is applicable to both material and social components of a system.
  • Enrolment: engaging and securing commitment from the end users of a product, service or system and supportive practices from communities, organizations or social environment.
• Organizational capability: HDIF evaluates the capacity of the organization and its partners to design, manage, and scale innovation in Tanzania, including a formal review of fiduciary risks and leadership capacity related to the proposals.
• Results Management: HDIF will review the ability to measure, monitor, and evaluate the impact of the project to ensure lessons learned can be captured and shared to improve and scale up appropriate innovations.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: between £500,000 and £1,000,000

How to Apply: Only applications received through the official HDIF Online Application Portal will be accepted. The Business Plan template for familiarization may be downloaded here.  While the Online Application Portal allows applicants to save their progress and return to update the form, it is highly recommended that applicants use the Business Plan template to save their answers in the event of any technical difficulties. Applicants should verify that their application is complete prior to submission.

Visit the Program Webpage for Details

Award Providers: The Human Development Innovation Fund (HDIF)

Important Notes: 
• Applicants must disclose any circumstances, including personal, financial and business activities that will, or might, give rise to a conflict of interest by applying for funding or if selected as a grantee.
• You may be contacted by HDIF to provide further information so please reconfirm that the contact email address entered on the form is correct. The contact email address entered on the form will be the email address used for all communication once your application has been processed.
• For any queries regarding your application please contact cfpqueries@hdif-tz.org