The Think Tank Initiative supported by the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) has launched the Call for Expressions of Interest from NGOs in South Asia and Latin America to provide funding support for undertaking research for informing and influencing social and economic policies in their countries in areas of growth, equity and poverty reduction.
The Think Tank Initiative emphasizes upon facilitating research and development activities in developing countries where policies and programmes lack the needy resources for effectively carrying out high-quality research. The initiative aims to select a group of independent policy research organizations and provide assistance to them to improve their organization performance, help them access training and technical support and sharing learning for such organizations.
The current call for expressions is limited to countries such as Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka in South Asia and to Bolivia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Paraguay and Peru in Latin America. Organizations from these countries should submit applications, demonstrating their commitment for policy-level research and should have considerable experience, ideas and long-term commitment for the proposed objectives under the new programme. The initiative will fund 15 organizations in each region and the support will be either for a full- four-year period or for two-year renewal term. The application forms can be submitted online via website or email. The last date to apply for the initiative is 28 September 2009. However, since prior registration is required for all applying organizations, the registration will close on 21 September 2009. Registration can be made online via the website. For more information, visit this link.
