Funding Available to Revitalising Rural Areas (Scotland)

The Scottish Government has announced the launch of the Scotland Rural Development Programme 2007 - 2013. The Rural Development Programme is now open farmers, foresters, businesses and community groups to submit their project ideas to a share in almost £800 million to develop rural Scotland. The overall aim of the Programme are to spport business viability, add value to the rural economy and facilitate increased market orientation and co-operation; to support a coherent and integrated approach to meet environmental objectives, landscape and biodiversity, water quality and tackling climate change; encourage private enterprise and entrepreneurship, improve services and infrastructure at local level & support Scotland's cultural opportunities; and to support capacity building and innovation. There is a two stage application process. Interested applicants will first be required to prepare a brief Statement of Intent (SoI). Feedback will then be provided on the viability of the SoI so that you can judge whether or not to develop it into a full Proposal for the second stage....
http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Rural/SRDP


Cooperation in Higher Education and Training between the EU and Australia, Japan, New Zealand and Korea (UK)

The European Commission has announced a call for proposals under the ICI Education Cooperation Programme. A total of ?2.5 million is available through this call for proposals is to support projects that promote better understanding and interaction between the peoples of the EU Member States and of the partner countries Australia, Japan, New Zealand and the Republic of Korea, including a broader knowledge of their languages, cultures and institutions, and to improve the quality of higher education and vocational education and training in the EU and in the partner countries. The type of actions that will be supported include international curriculum development projects that involve short term mobility of students between the EU and the partner ICI country. Submission of grant requests under this call is open to higher education institutions and to vocational education and training institutions. Eligible applicants must be established in one of the 27 Member States of the European Union. It is anticipated that funding will be provided for 4-5 EU-Australia projects, 2-3 EU-Japan projects, 1 EU-New Zealand project, and 1-2 EU-Korea projects. The closing date for applications is the 6th June 2008....
http://ec.europa.eu/education/programmes/eu_others/call08_en.html


Department of Health to Launch New Bidding Round Through the Social Enterprise Investment Fund (England)

The Department of Health's has announced that a second call for proposals through the Social Enterprise Investment Fund (SEIF) will open in April 2008. Under the SEIF, a total of £73 million will be available between 2007 and 2011 to stimulate and encourage the start up and development of a vibrant social enterprises in the health and social care sector. Eligible organisations that can apply for funding include; multi-agency partnerships, particularly voluntary and community groups wishing to use their expertise to provide services across health and social care; existing social enterprises looking to expand into health and social care; and groups of professionals (e.g. nurses, therapists), seeking to form a social enterprise to deliver their services. Funding will be in the form of loans, grants and equity capital or a mixture of these, depending on the recipient organisation's needs and structure. The application deadline is the 31st October 2007. Eligible organisations will have until July to submit applications for support and funding. The Department of Health will confirm the amount of revenue and capital funding available for this funding round shortly....
http://www.dh.gov.uk/en/Managingyourorganisation/Commissioning/Socialenterprise/DH_073426


BIG To Launch New £90 Million Fund to Support Facilities for Young People (England)

The Big Lottery Fund has announced that it will launch a new £190 Million fund to support projects that deliver world class facilities for young people. The programme "myplace" , which will run between 2008 and 2010 will provide grants of between £1 million and £5 million for projects that; provide young people with exciting and safe places to go in their leisure time where they can get involved in a positive range of activities; allow more young people, particularly the most disadvantaged, participate in positive leisure time activities that support their personal and social development; enable more young people to have access to information, advice and support services from within places they feel comfortable; and that provide for stronger partnership working between local authorities, third, private and public sector partners to plan, deliver and operate financially sustainable youth facilities with and for young people. All projects will need to demonstrate genuine cross-sector partnership between public sector bodies and third and/or private sector organisations. £160 million will be available to support projects in the first year of which £50 milion will be available for fastrack projects that are already well developed and therefore able to submit robust business and capital plans with their application. Application and guidance materials for the first funding round will be available from 6 May 2008. Regional seminars are taking place during early May to inform groups about myplace. The deadline for fast track applications is the 29th July 2008 and the deadline for the standard route is the 30th September 2008....
http://www.biglotteryfund.org.uk/prog_myplace.htm?regioncode=-uk&progStatus=open&status=theProg&title=myplace


Call for Proposals - Town Twinning Citizens Meetings (UK)

Under the Town Twinning Initiative, which is part of the new Active Citizens for Europe Programme (2007 -2013) grants of between ?2,000 and ?20,000 are available to support Town Twinning citizens meetings. Town twinning citizens' meetings consist in bringing together a wide range of citizens and citizens' groups from towns already twinned to further develop strong, informal and personal relations between their citizens, to reinforce the participants' commitment to European integration; and to contribute to the development of an active European citizenship. To be eligible the applicant needs to be the municipality or its twinning association in which the meeting will take place. Citizens meetings funded under this call for proposals must take place between 1st October and 31st December 2008. The deadline for applications is the 1st June 2008....
http://eacea.ec.europa.eu/citizenship/action1/towntwinning/funding_en.htm


Strengthening the Voluntary Sector - Independence Grants Programme 2008 (England)

The Baring Foundation has announced that the Strengthening the Voluntary Sector - Independence Programme 2008 is now open for applications. This year £900,000 is available to strengthen the independence of advice and advocacy organisations (organisations whose purpose is to support people to secure their legal rights and entitlements) in the cities of Bristol, Coventry, Manchester or Sheffield or in the counties of Kent or Lincolnshire. The deadline for submitting applications is 30 June 2008. This year the STVS programme has a tight focus. The last round in 2006 was relatively open and a very high number of applications yielded a success rate for applicants of 4%. In order to increase the success rate the Foundation has introduced geographical criteria and a focused theme within the issue of independence from government. Previous grants awarded have included Hammersmith Women's Aid who received a grant to develop organisational potential through joint working or merger with parallel providers and Parents for Children who received funding through the programme to explore the potential for collaboration with other adoption and fostering agencies ....
http://www.baringfoundation.org.uk/