Deadline: 14-Aug-22

The Ocean Risk and Resilience Action Alliance (ORRAA) is inviting proposals for financial support to implement the next generation of innovative coastal and ocean finance and insurance products or develop tools that better analyse, predict, and reduce ocean risk.

The Call is financially supported by the Government of Canada and administered by the ORRAA Secretariat

Project Focus

Project proposals must fall into one of ORRAA’s Financial Innovation or Science and Research priority pathways, and advance ORRAA’s mission by either:

• Developing and implementing innovative finance and insurance products.
• Undertaking research or developing tools that better analyse, predict, model, and reduce ocean risk.
• In addition, projects must:
  • Promote the development of ocean and coastal Nature-based Solutions (NbS) or mitigate risk multipliers like overfishing and pollution.
  • Align with and include the priorities and interests of local communities.
  • Deliver enhanced economic, social, and cultural resilience for climate vulnerable coastal communities.
  • Be biodiversity positive, lead to either net zero or climate positive outcomes, and “do no harm” (do not result in negative impacts on communities or the ecosystems they are designed in which to build resilience).

Grant Types 

• Seed grant: Tailored for organisations to design innovative solutions over a shorter timeframe that might be eligible for future project grant funding.
• Project grant: Tailored for organisations to test and pilot innovative ideas, or scale up and replicate proven ideas in new contexts.

Funding Information

• Seed grant: Up to US$10,000 (3 months)
• Project grant: Up to US$400,000 (Up to 24 months)

Geographic Focus 

Projects should either be located or deployed in coastal countries that are Official Development Assistance (ODA) and UNFCCC eligible, which do not conflict with applicable individual and consolidated sanctions set out by the United States or Canada. Special consideration will be given to projects located or deployed in Small Island Developing States (SIDS) and Coastal Least Developed Countries (LDCs).

Eligible countries: Albania, Algeria, Angola, Argentina, Bangladesh, Belize, Benin, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Cabo Verde, Cambodia, Cameroon, Colombia, Comoros, Congo, Cook Islands, Costa Rica, Cote D’Ivoire, Djibouti, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Fiji, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Grenada, Guatemala, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Jamaica, Jordan, Kenya, Kiribati, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Maldives, Marshall Islands, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mexico, Micronesia, Montenegro, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Nauru, Niue, Pakistan, Panama, Papua New Guinea, Peru, Philippines, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Samoa, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Solomon Islands, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Suriname, Tanzania, Thailand, Timor-Leste, Togo, Tonga, Tunisia, Tuvalu, Viet Nam

Eligibility Criteria

• Project proposals must meet the criteria to be considered by the ORRAA Secretariat. These criteria ensure that projects supported by ORRAA help to advance its mission to catalyse the investment of at least US$500 million into coastal and marine natural capital through the development and deployment of financial products that build the resilience of 250 million climate vulnerable coastal people, by 2030.
• Individuals, public institutions, development finance institutions, private sector, and civil society (NGOs, think tanks, academics) are all welcome to submit proposals.
• ORRAA’s Call for Proposals is open to all innovators in the ocean finance space.

For more information, visit https://oceanriskalliance.org/resource/financing-the-next-generation-of-innovative-ocean-finance-projects/