Overview

The Adaptation Fund Board (the Board) previously made Project Formulation Grants (PFGs) available to accredited national implementing entities (NIEs) of the Adaptation Fund (the Fund) to build the capacity of NIEs in project preparation and design. NIEs that were at the concept development stage of the Fund’s project cycle process had the option to request a PFG up to a maximum of US$50,000 per project together with their submission of the project concept to the Board.

PFGs support project formulation activities, including among others feasibility studies or consultations. A PFG could only be awarded if it is presented along with a project pre-concept or project concept presented to and endorsed by the Board.

Component one of the Fund’s Readiness Programme for Climate Finance is focused on providing support to accredited implementing entities of the Fund. Under this component, the secretariat will provide support to accredited implementing entities of the Fund. The grants were meant to support NIEs, PFGs are now available to support all accredited implementing entities tap into external (international or national) expertise in the form of short-term consultant assignments to undertake specific technical assessments such as environmental impact assessments (EIAs) a vulnerability assessment (VAs), risk assessments, gender studies, and other environmental and social assessments.

Accessibility of PFG grants

Since the forty-second meeting of the Adaptation Fund Board (AFB42) held in April 2024, PFGs are now available for all IEs. All accredited IEs  of the Fund are eligible to apply for PFG grants. The PFG grant should be requested at the same time when IEs going through the two-step approval process submits project concepts or the three-step approval process to submit project pre-concepts for regional proposals.

The limits for PFG grants were amended since AFB42 as follows:

  1. For single country projects across all funding windows [regular, LLA and large innovation] are accessible through NIEs, RIEs and NIEs

    1. Project size below US$2M = PFG amount US$50,0000
    2. Project size US$2M but less than US$5M = PFG amount US$100,000
    3. Project size US$5M and above =PFG amount US$150,000
    4. LLA projects = PFG amount US$150,000 plus additional PFG up to US$100,000. (to tap into the additional US$100,000 requests will be evaluated on a case by case basis)

  2. For regional projects across all funding windows

    1. Project size US$5M and above with less than three countries = PFG amount of US$150,000
    2. Project size US$5M and above with 3 and above countries = PFG additional amount of US$15,000 per additional country up to a maximum of US$250,000.

When a 3-step approach is used, the maximum amount of PFG that can be requested at Pre-concept stage is limited twenty percent 20% of the maximum total PFG applicable to the project.

Eligible PFG grant activities

The following activities can be done utilizing PFG grants.

  1. Local consultations, and/or workshops to discuss the specific project and program ideas (including translation into local languages, preparation of background papers, etc).
  2. Gender and Environmental and Social risk analyses and formulation of Environmental and Social Management Plan and Gender Action Plan
  3. Travel costs for experts, when required, for consultations and discussions with interested parties and stakeholders, and local participation as needed in project design.
  4. Free prior and informed consent and related consultations where appropriate to ensure compliance with the Environmental and Social Policy.
  5. Country, region, or site-specific risk assessments, including identifying hazards, vulnerabilities, development of scenarios and determining hazard mitigation options.
  6. Specific analyses in support of the proposed projects (policy analysis, data inventories and analyses, cost effectiveness, etc).
  7. Enabling activities that support devolving the decision making regarding the project design to the lowest appropriate level.
  8. Identification of project or programme indicators and development of monitoring and evaluation plan.
  9. Consultancies and contracts to develop program and/or project options.
  10. Costs of translating documents into and out of English.
  11. Identification of project/programme level indicators
  12. Assessing capacity of executing partners.

Applying for PFG grants

The  updated template for a Request for Project Formulation Grant (PFG) is also available under Project Proposal Materials