On June 12, at 15:00, Mr. Suren Papikyan, the RA Minister of Territorial Administration and Development will meet with the Coalitions, which has been awarded sub-grants in the target sectors “Public Finance Management” and “”Economy of the “Commitment Constructive Dialogue” Project. The meeting is aimed at presenting to the Minister the “Budget for Everyone” and “Participatory Monitoring for the Establishment of Smart Communities in Armenia” Projects, which are implemented by the “Winnet Armenia” Network of Women Resource Centers and “Hamazark” (Community Development and Participatory Management Association) respectively. Representatives of the Project, as well as Mr. Karen Zadoyan, the “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” Project Manager and Mr. Emin Yeritsyan, Local Self Government Issues Coordinator of the CCD project will attend the meeting. .
The “Commitment Constructive Dialogue” Project is implemented with the financial support of the European Union by a Consortium of civil society organisations, which are the Armenian Lawyers’ Association (lead organisation), Agora Central Europe (NGO based in the Czech Republic), the Armenian Centre for Democratic Education-CIVITAS, the International Centre for Human Development, the SME Cooperation Association and the Union of Communities of Armenia. The program was launched on 15 December 2016. The duration of the project is 34 months.
The 9 target areas of the project are: Justice, Human Rights, Public Finance Management, Business, Education, Social sphere: Social inclusion of children with disabilities, Agriculture, Economy, and Energy. It is anticipated to disclose through Government – CSO constructive dialogue format with the competent authorities of the sector; develop, advocate and improve public policy programs through innovative ideas and solutions.
The main objective of the Project is to enhance the influence of CSOs on the public policy process, and the specific objectives are to strengthen the ability of CSOs to build coalitions and to strengthen the ability of CSOs to focus on constructive and strategic policy engagement with local and central government partners.
Sub-grants to CSOs and CSO coalitions (networks) will be provided in the scope of the Project in two stages. The objective of the sub-grants is to build coalitions (networks) or strengthen the already existing ones ensuring their development and increased impact on public policy development, advocacy and public participation in these processes in the target sectors, as well as to enhance the Coalitions’ internal capacity.
Each grant field will be provided with one grant program for a period of 12 months. Each of the grant programs will be financed at the rate of up to 25 million Armenian drams, and in the second stage the winners of the first round will be provided with additional funding up to seven million five hundred thousand Armenian drams. The second phase of the Grant Program implementation period is six months.
Grant agreements with the winning Coalition have been signed on May 31, 2011, and the implementation of the projects has started since June 1 of the current year.
