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SIDA’s Water and Food Security Fund in Partnership with USAID: Request for Information

Deadline: 4 October 2013

The Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA) in partnership with the United States Agency for International Agency (USAID) has established a $25 million fund called ‘Securing Water for Food’ to improve water sustainability and boost food security.

This is not a request for proposals, but only a request for information to improve the program.

Launched on 2nd September 2013 in Stockholm, the Securing Water for Food: A Grand Challenge for Development The Grand Challenges for Development (GCD) program is an innovation and acceleration initiative that began in 2011. Through GCDs, USAID and its partners are sourcing and accelerating the best science and technology-focused innovators, entrepreneurs, and businesses that have the potential to solve specific development challenges. Innovators can come from anywhere in the world. Implementation must take lace in a developing or emerging country.

Securing Water for Food is the fifth GCD launched over the past two years and focuses on the water/food nexus. Through this program, we are seeking innovations that will improve water efficiency along the food value chain (see diagram below), thus boosting food security and alleviating poverty.

For this Fund, SIDA and USAID are currently seeking comments and/or questions (responses) from interested parties around the world to help prove the program.

Submittal Information

  • Responses may be submitted within the body of the email or as an attachment.
  • Responses must include the following information:
  • Organization name and address;
  • Organization point of contact name, telephone number, and email address;
  • Organization business size and status (e.g., small business, 8(a), HUBZone, etc.), the number of
  • years in business, and affiliate information;
  • The organization’s GSA Schedule contract number, if applicable.

In addition to general comments and suggestions, we are requesting specific responses to the following questions:

  1. Do you feel that the matching fund requirement (outside market-based financing or self-investment) is reasonable at the validation stage?
  2. Should matching funds be an eligibility requirement for innovators at both the validation and scale/commercial growth stages? -Or-Should we only require matching funds as a milestone that must be met in order to receive additional Founding Partner financing?
  3. Should we provide milestone-based funding? How do we provide milestone-based funding to ensure the best use of our resources and simultaneously allow for risk-taking and failure?
  4. What is your perception of the eligibility and evaluation criteria? Are the evaluation criteria  appropriate? Is this rigorous evaluation process too complicated and time consuming for your organization?
  5. Are the size of the grants enough of an incentive for you to apply to this program?
  6. What elements of the services offered under “non-financial support/acceleration” are most  attractive to you? Least attractive? Is anything missing?
  7. How easy would it be for you to find experienced implementation partners in a developing or emerging country?
  8. How could we improve the program to maximize partnership opportunities between medium- to large-sized companies and entrepreneurs?
  9. How can we improve the design of the program to ensure that supported innovations are sustainable?

For more information, visit this link.