Table of contents
Summary 4
1. Background 5
1.1. Political agreement 5
1.2. Country strategies 5
1.3. From a country strategy to a country programme through competitive calls and policy orientated choices 5
1.4. A country call for South Initiatives 6
2. Definition 7
2.1. Definition 7
2.2. Concept 7
3. Funding and implementation period 8
3.1. Indicative budget 8
3.2. Implementation period 8
4. Criteria of eligibility 9
4.1. Geographic location and local partner institution(s) 9
4.2. Flemish promotership 11
4.3. Country strategy 11
4.3.1. Country strategic frameworks 11
4.3.2. Research platforms Uganda 11
4.4. Project Cycle Management (PCM) 12
4.5. Formatting and submission modalities 13
4.6. Not covered by South Initiatives 13
5. Drafting the proposal 13
5.1. Format 13
5.2. Logical Framework Matrix (LFM) and Indicative Operational Plan (IOP) 14
5.3. Budget proposal 14
5.3.1. Format 14
5.3.2. Financial guidelines 14
5.4. Written confirmation copromoter(s) 15
5.5. Brief CV local and Flemish (co)promoters 15
5.6. Declaration for Flemish promoters or co-promoters who are not only affiliated to a Flemish university or university college 15
6. Submission modalities 15
6.1. Via the ICOS of the Flemish association 15
6.2. Form and deadline 16
7. Selection procedure 16
7.1. Selection process 16
7.2. Selection criteria 16
8. Implementation and reporting modalities 17
8.1. Agreement and payment 17
8.2. Implementation of the South Initiative 17
8.3. Reporting 17
9. Timetable 18
9.1. Internal Deadlines 18
9.2. Overall timetable 18
10. Appendices 19
10.1. Enclosed formats 19
10.2. Accessible at the VLIR-UOS website: www.vliruos.be 20
11. More information 22
11.1. ICOS per association 22
11.2. VLIR-UOS 23
ABBREVIATIONS 24
Summary
Budget: / Max. € 75.000 per projectDuration: / Max. 2 years
Eligibility: / Flemish universities and university colleges
Countries: / Cuba, Ecuador, Tanzania, Uganda, Vietnam, South Africa, Ethiopia[1]
Launch of the call: / 30 September 2013
Deadline submission project proposal and all annexes: / 3 December 2013
Selection date: / End January 2014 (indicative)
Submission: / by the Flemish promoter
VLIR-UOS supports partnerships
between universities and university colleges
in Flanders and the South
looking for innovative responses
to global and local challenges
www.vliruos.be
Call for proposals for South Initiatives 201430 September 2013 / 2/25
1. Background
1.1. Political agreement
Considering the agreement of 22 April 2010 between VLIR-UOS and the Belgian government, and the resulting concentration on 20 countries for its South programme, VLIR-UOS needed to come up with a new country list. This list was made up considering past cooperation and a set of criteria (Human Development Index (HDI) and other) through a method called “Benefit of the Doubt”. For each country, VLIR-UOS needed to develop a country strategy to be implemented through a country programme (sum and mix of interventions going from individual to country level interventions).
1.2. Country strategies
A VLIR-UOS country strategy represents an informed policy choice that serves as a framework for programming, in fact a roadmap for cooperation. This framework is sufficiently broad and multidisciplinary in order to ensure that VLIR-UOS can continue to facilitate academic partnerships and related initiatives within the context of a long term country strategy - 12 year term - with a general objective.
A country strategy is the result of numerous inputs and consultations with a wide spectrum of actors in Flanders and the specific country.
So far country strategies have been developed for the following countries: DR Congo, Cuba, Ecuador, Uganda, Tanzania, Vietnam, Ethiopia and South Africa. Country strategies for Burundi and Suriname are under way.
1.3. From a country strategy to a country programme through competitive calls and policy orientated choices
VLIR-UOS embraces project funding through open competitive calls and a merit and quality based selection. The academic quality and competitive character will continue to exist. However, calls for proposals will make reference to the respective country strategies. Given sufficient quality, proposals will be further evaluated and ranked in terms of their possible contribution to the strategic framework.
The translation of this strategy to academic partnerships and related initiatives through competitive calls and need/opportunity based interventions, or in other words the totality of the selected and funded strategic projects, form a country programme. The following scheme represents the evolution from country strategy to country programme.
A country programme aims at integrating activities/ building blocks at different levels (national, institutional, departmental, individual etc) and of different types (scholarship, project, programme). As such, the South Initiatives act at the level of specific focus areas at sub-institutional level (departmental) but contribute to the country-wide objectives and therefore sometimes include cross-institutional and national-wide activities:
INTERVENTION TYPE / LEVEL OF INTERVENTIONNATIONAL
- Network University Cooperation
- Research Platforms
- Other national-level projects / More direct contribution to country-level priorities and capacity building
IUC / Institutional strengthening and capacity building
TEAM and South Initiatives / Strengthening and capacity building at departmental/ faculty level
Scholars / Reinforcing the individual
1.4. A country call for South Initiatives
The Bureau UOS has decided to launch a South Initiative 2014 call in seven of the eight countries for which a VLIR-UOS country strategy exists (Cuba, Ecuador, Tanzania, Uganda, Vietnam South Africa and Ethiopia). For RD Congo a separate RD Congo call will be launched in the beginning of October 2013.[2]
The demand for a call for South Initiatives is high, both within the partner countries and the Flemish universities and university colleges. In the first place because of the fact that this type of projects, due to its limited size in terms of budget and timeframe, is a good way for newcomers to check and try whether they would fit into, and feel comfortable with the way university cooperation for development is conceived and organised within VLIR-UOS. Through the South Initiatives, VLIR-UOS wants to provide the opportunity to (new) professors/ lecturers with no or limited experience in (university) cooperation for development, to get involved. South initiatives offer as such opportunities for exploration, to test new ideas and new partnerships, and can be considered as ‘eye openers’ and as a breeding house. In addition, South Initiatives can offer opportunities to broaden the scope of current or past research projects whereby the goal is not only to harvest but also to multiplicate at a national level.
2. Definition
2.1. Definition
South Initiatives are short-term, small, one-off projects with a limited budget, initiated by academics/ lecturers at a university/ university college or a (national) non-profit research institute in a developing country, in collaboration with Flemish academics/ lecturers. Also other civil society actors in the South can be involved, but only as supporting partner and not as applicant.
South Initiatives are meant for forms of cooperation that currently do not fit within the existing UOS programmes. Funding through this budget line is meant to facilitate and organise new partnerships and new, innovative forms of cooperation. Within the new country strategy approach, South Initiatives are particularly relevant to identify new partners, to bring innovation in the country portfolio and to join forces around nationally relevant topics through selected pilot initiatives.
2.2. Concept
The purpose of South Initiatives is to explore, facilitate and organise new partnerships and innovative forms/ modalities of cooperation that contribute with the proposed country strategic priorities (seed money). They are pilots, so per definition short term, that may subsequently grow into ‘regular’ projects within the existing VLIR-UOS programmes.
The South Initiatives can also be an important tool in order to promote synergetic actions within a country or regional strategy, and more in particular involving TEAM or Own Initiative projects, IUC programmes and other VLIR-UOS activities or activities funded by other donors.
In the same context, South Initiatives can offer opportunities to broaden the scope of current or past research projects, and possibly even bring them to a national level.
Examples:
· Exploring and formalising a new partnership by exchanging lecturers/ professors, doing joint research and co-organising training courses;
· National ‘pilot’ initiatives/ ‘seed money’ in view of serving transversal needs identified in the context of the country strategy consultations and important for successful project development (examples: national level workshops on innovative teaching and learning skills development, intellectual property rights development, research capacity training, …)
· Elaborating a framework for a future TEAM project by setting up a basic laboratory and initiating research activities in order to strengthen collaboration for sustainable development;
· Visits to further elaborate an existing collaboration between a professor/ lecturer in the South and a Flemish professor/ lecturer as a result of earlier contacts made;
· A feasibility study in the South on the establishment of an international M.Sc. programme, or a part thereof, or a first pilot of what is meant to become a local training initiative organised in the South, or a brainstorming meeting on quality improvement/ extension of a local training programme;
· Mobility of academics/ lecturers/students to the South to explore partnership ideas, e.g. in the context of travel grants for Flemish students, and/ or to develop a system of quality control for exchange of students, or to explore a project idea;
· Quality improvement of an existing curriculum;
· Exploring ideas for collaboration with Belgian and other actors in the country/ region concerned;
· …
3. Funding and implementation period
3.1. Indicative budget
VLIR-UOS reserved a budget of € 2.100.000 for South Initiatives 2014 in the 7 countries (Cuba, Ecuador, Uganda, Tanzania and Vietnam, South Africa, Ethiopia). This budget is indicative and depending on the quality of individual proposals.
The overall budget for this call is subject to final approval by the Belgian government of the overall VLIR-UOS budget for 2014.
The indicative maximum budget per project is € 75.000 (total budget for the total project duration).
3.2. Implementation period
The South Initiatives will have to start between the date of formal approval of the South Initiatives Programme 2014 (probably April / May 2014) and 31 December 2014. They are limited in duration (max. 2 years). Extensions to the implementation period are not possible.
4. Criteria of eligibility
4.1. Geographic location and local partner institution(s)
· The cooperation is limited to institutions in the 7 countries for which a VLIR-UOS country strategy has been formulated:
1. Cuba
2. Ecuador
3. Tanzania
4. Uganda
5. Vietnam
6. South Africa
7. Ethiopia
· In Uganda, the call is only open to the 8 universities that have been selected in the framework of the country strategy:
- Busitema University (BU)
- Gulu University (GU)
- Kyambogo University (KYU)
- Makerere University (MAK)
- Mbarara University of Science and Technology (MUST)
- Mountains of the Moon University (MMU)
- Uganda Christian University (UCU)
- Uganda Martyrs University (UMU)
In the framework of the Ugandan research platforms (see 4.3.2.) it is recommended that project proposals are submitted by teams of at least 2 Ugandan universities (a leading partner (promoter) and (a) supporting partner(s) (copromoter(s)).
Makerere University (MAK) and Mountains of the Moon University (MMU) are only eligible if these universities are involved as supporting partners (no core funding).
The platform coordinator (in Uganda and in Belgium) can be promoter of maximum 1 South Initiative or 1 TEAM project within the platform he/she coordinates.
Only in Uganda the number of partner universities was explicitly limited to 8. In the other 6 countries (Cuba, Ecuador, Tanzania, Vietnam, South Africa and Ethiopia), no restrictions have been made, however in the country strategies indications are given on the opportunities for cooperation in a selected number of universities (see background documents).
· VLIR-UOS prefers to cooperate with university colleges and universities which fulfil their threefold role of a university, or with non-profit (national) research institutes attempting to freely disseminate and make accessible the acquired knowledge. VLIR-UOS aims at cooperation with (a) Southern partner(s) (university and/or university college and/or (national) non-profit research institute) which has/ have potential with respect to (university) education and/or research, which play(s) an emancipatory role within its/ their society, which pursues an active policy of cultural, ethnic, social and philosophical non-discrimination. VLIR-UOS encourages Southern partners to work together with other social actors in the country, yet these can only be involved as supporting partner.
· South Initiatives are limited to initiatives with institutions in the South that have limited financial resources from their own.
· South Initiatives which aim at a cooperation with an university involved in a new or ongoing IUC are only eligible if this university is involved as a supporting partner (no core funding). The IUC programmes are new or ongoing at the following universities in the countries from the list (see also ‘IUC Partnerships’ on http://iuc.vliruos.be/):
- Hue University (HU, Vietnam)
- Mountains of the Moon University (MMU, Uganda)
- Mzumbe University (MU, Tanzania)
- Nelson Mandela African Institute of Science and Technology (NM-AIST, Tanzania)
- UCuenca (Universidad de Cuenca, Ecuador)
- Universidad de Oriente (UO, Cuba)
- Limpopo University (UL, South Africa)
- Jimma University (JU, Ethiopia)
· Project proposals which aim at a cooperation with former IUC partners are only eligible if this university is involved as a supporting partner (no core funding). They can also be applicant and receive core funding if it concerns cooperation with a(n) academic unit(s) which was (were) not part of the projects financed during the second phase of the partner programme. The former IUC partners in the 7 countries eligible for this call are (see also ‘IUC Partnerships’ on http://iuc.vliruos.be/):
- Can Tho University (CTU, Vietnam)
- Escuela Superior Politécnica Del Litoral (ESPOL , Ecuador)
- Hanoi University of Technology (HUT, Vietnam)
- Sokoine University of Agriculture (SUA, Tanzania)
- Universidad Central Marta Abreu de las Villas (UCLV, Cuba)
- Mekelle University (MU, Ethiopia)
- University of the Western Cape (UWC, South Africa)