Funding Opportunity to implement the Kazakhstan Local Governance Activity

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is seeking applications for a cooperative agreement from qualified entities to implement the Kazakhstan Local Governance Activity program.

The Government of Kazakhstan launched its 2030 Concept for Development of Local Self Governance (LSG) in 2021 with the objective to improve government responsiveness to citizens and increase resources for sub-national governments. Specifically, it called for:

• Direct election of mayors of villages and rural areas in 2021 (held on July 25, 2021) and of districts and cities by 2025;

• Transfer of additional taxes to the LSG level, including single land tax, use of land payments, taxes from land sales, payments from the sale of the right to lease land;

• Simplified procedures for implementation of LSG budgets;

• Creation of LSG councils or other representative bodies to engage communities and incorporate citizens in decision-making;

• Granting mayors the ability to initiate petitions and broadcasting government meetings; and,

• Gradual distribution of powers to local government bodies.

Goals & Objectives

• Goal: Strengthen Local Governance in Kazakhstan Support the conditions and space for strengthened local governance in which civil society more effectively represents citizen voices and engages the government so that sub-national government institutions are more effective in their mandate and response to citizen needs.

• Objective 1: Civil society more effectively represents the interests of citizens.

• Objective 2: Local governments more effectively engage with civil society and citizens

Aspects

• The backbone organization will work closely with USAID Central Asia to achieve the key objectives of the project. The selected organization will deliver on the following key aspects:

  • Coordinate and ensure inclusive partnership and community mobilization, women led organizations, community stakeholders and municipal level government actors to participate at all the stages of the activity.

  • Facilitate processes that ensure multi-stakeholder engagement and inputs in the strategic design processes; and

  • Support participatory documentation and analysis of emerging and best practices and develop stronger capacity of all stakeholders involved.

Characteristics

• USAID seeks applications that demonstrate the following characteristics:

  • Make use of existing organizational capacities and resources by working with a wide variety of stakeholders with the interest and ability to contribute to the program objective.

  • Identify, engage with, and build on already established and/or emerging community-level actors and partnerships around Kazakhstan.

  • Foster ways to directly engage citizens and communities in setting priorities for local initiatives in partnership with local governments.

  • Utilize a ‘learning by doing’ approach, experimenting with interventions, assessing impact, and adapting and scaling up or down.

Funding Information

• Estimated Total Program Funding: $2,000,000

• Award Ceiling: $2,000,000

• Award Floor: $2,000,000