World Bank to finance civic engagement among rural youth

The theme of the 2008 World Bank Small Grants Programme (SGP) is “Civic Engagement of Rural Youth”. The 2008 SGP budget made available to Moldova is USD 35,000. The grants planned for 2008 will range between USD 2,000 and 6,000. In 2008 the programme will focus on training and interaction of youth groups with different social partners which would strengthen the conscience and promotion of rural youth’s civic engagement. These projects and activities are aimed to consolidate the partnership with the public sector, with other organisations of the civil society and the private sector, thus influencing and strengthening the mechanisms of participation, responsibility and trust. SGP finances up to a half of the budget proposed for the project. The rest of the money will be covered by contributions from other sources, including social partners of NGOs. Created in 1983, the Small Grants Programme is one of the few global programmes of the World Bank that directly finances civil society organisations. Starting 1998, it was decentralised and the programme has been administered through the Country Offices, including the WB Office in Moldova which has been implementing SGP for 11 years now. The total sum allocated to Moldova in this period was about USD 400,000. 50 national and 45 local NGOs became the beneficiaries of 92 SGP grants.