Seventh Blue Grant Fund becomes bigger and wider   |10 May 2023

Ms Jeremie

The seventh cycle of the Blue Grant Fund (BGF7) sets a new bar, having amassed more experience and opens up all five strategic objectives.

Seychelles Conservation and Climate Adaptation Trust (SeyCCAT) chief executive Marie-May Jeremie has said the Blue Grant Fund (BGF7) seeks to fund projects under any of the five strategic objectives and what has been done over the course of the cycles is that every year, there would be a call that speaks to one of the strategic objectives. With the seventh cycle, because of the new donor, it has opened up all five of the strategic objectives.

“We expect the projects this year to be more cross cutting, because people now have a lot more options in terms of what they will focus their project on,” she stated. 

With the experience gained, small changes are made to better have and uptick in delegates of the programme and to provide clarity and support.

“It helps make the programme a success,” she stated.

The initial calls when they first began did not have a lot of applicants due to the fact that some people did not understand what the Blue Grant Fund was about.

“In subsequent cycles, we have invested in the effort of making SeyCCAT a little bit more accessible.”

There has been a lot of training with potential applicants and grantees over the years and SeyCCAT still runs them today. There is a support mechanism that has been established to help applicants to be able to submit their forms. There have been training workshops on Mahé and Praslin every year and there are even one-on-one consultations.

“We put a lot of effort in our communications on TV and on radio, on our socials, we make sure we have a WhatsApp group to answer in real time, questions,” she added.

This is done to really help the applicants who are going through the application and to also get the maximum number of applicants.

“We see that this helps a lot and this is something we intend to continue,” explained CEO Jeremie.

There have been environmental non-governmental organisations (NGOs) such as Island Conservation Society (ICS), Marine Conservation Society Seychelles (MCSS) which have been awarded multiple grants over the years to implement the projects that they have. Individuals and entities who have been successful in prior applications with their projects will have a little bit more of a due diligence. However, Ms Jeremie stated that with every cycle, “we even the playing field and every application is treated fairly and with respect”.

There is a decision-making structure within SeyCCAT that is the Blue Grant committee, which consists of experts from different sectors in Seychelles and sectors that are relevant in the strategic objectives of SeyCCAT. They review every application that is received per cycle. They then make recommendations to the board who is the ultimate decision-making authority.

SeyCCAT has also upped the amount of support and accompaniment for grantees. For a lot of grantees, this is the first time that they would be awarded a grant, and there are other responsibilities that come with the implementation of a project. Things such as monitoring projects to make sure that they are delivering and spending according to what SeyCCAT has approved.

Throughout the lifetime of the project, it is provided with additional support. Site visits are carried out to make sure that the right activities are being done. In addition, when the report is done there are also systems to make sure that it provides the correct information and that it meets all the expectations.

These types of support are granted periodically and not just at the end of the project. This is to ensure that problems that may arise are caught earlier and provided guidance on the necessary changes to have a successful project.

Even for applying for the grants, there are mechanisms that will help applicants with their project preparations. There are resources to help the applicants develop the project.

The BGF7 offers small (up to R100,000), medium (up to R1 million), and large (up to R2 million) grants for a total of R31 million made available for this funding cycle.

Sunny Esparon