The Beyond the Grid Fund for Africa (BGFA) will open a second funding round for Uganda at the end of March 2023. This is BGFA’s fifth call for proposals (BGFA5) to incentivise clean off-grid energy solutions in sub-Saharan Africa.
It is expected that up to EUR 6.2 million will remain unallocated from the first call in Uganda (BGFA3) launched in April 2021, and this new call aims to make these funds available to further energy service providers.
The evaluation of the final applications to BGFA3 was completed in spring 2022, and the first contracted projects were announced in December 2022. In total, 6-7 energy service providers will be contracted through the first funding round. Funds for Uganda were contributed by Sweden and Denmark, and additional funds for the upcoming call may also be made available by Norway, who joined the BGFA programme at the end of 2022.
All interested private sector companies are invited to apply for the new call, except those who were successful in securing financing or are in the advanced stages of negotiations under BGFA3.
REEEP will continue to be engaged throughout the rollout of BGFA5 by providing market insight and technical input in the early stages of assessment, and the later stages of assessment will see REEEP engaged in due diligence of prospective firms and eventually providing technical assistance to successful applicants.
Opening at the end of March 2023, the new call for proposals will use a simplified, single stage, online application process, in which applicants will be requested to submit a business plan while still meeting the key BGFA requirements from previous calls.
Further information, selection criteria and guidelines will be made available on the BGFA website beyondthegrid.africa once the new funding round opens.
For further information on REEEP’s work on BGFA in Uganda, please contact: Andrew Loebus, Head of Programme for East Africa, BGFA at andrew.loebus@reeep.org.
