GHAI Healthy Food Policy Advocacy Fund 2023: The Healthy Food Policy Advocacy Fund, part of the Global Health Advocacy Incubator (GHAI), is currently accepting new applications through Monday, September 4, 2023.
About the Healthy Food Policy Advocacy Fund
The Healthy Food Policy Advocacy Fund provides critical support to help advance promising legislative or regulatory efforts on healthy food policy.
The purpose of the Advocacy Fund is to support the adoption of evidence-informed healthy food policies by investing in timebound and strategic campaigns and growing the food policy evidence base and a global network of advocates.
The GHAI Healthy Food Policy Advocacy Fund grants are intended to support urgent, short-term campaigns in response to needs and opportunities related to healthy food policies.
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Areas include
- Taxes on sweetened beverages and/or ultra-processed food
- Front-of-package warning labelling (FOPL)
- Restrictions on marketing of unhealthy food and beverages
- Healthy food environments and food procurement and service policies in the public sector, including schools
The Advocacy Fund may also be used to block harmful policies that are not informed by the best available evidence and/or free of conflict of interest, and that would set negative precedents and undermine effective food policies.
Since the Advocacy Fund launched in 2020, there have been significant programmatic and policy achievements, such as
- Expanding the Food Policy Program’s geographic scope and population impact;
- Supporting the approval of evidence-informed food policies in 5 countries;
- A comprehensive healthy food policy law covering FOPL, marketing and the school food environment in Argentina; and
- FOPL in Uruguay and sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) tax policies in Nigeria, Pakistan and Ghana.
The Advocacy Fund provides strategic and technical support to grant recipients as they execute their advocacy campaigns. Learn more about the GHAI approach here.
The Advocacy Fund is managed by GHAI and funded by Bloomberg Philanthropies.
Who Can Apply for the GHAI Healthy Food Policy Advocacy Fund.
The Advocacy Fund grants legally registered not-for-profit entities in low- and middle-income countries. GHAI Healthy Food Policy Advocacy Fund grants are available for fast-breaking policy opportunities and/or campaigns to improve healthy food policy.
Applicants should meet the following criteria:
- Applicant must work on a specific policy objective that is concrete and ideally achievable within approximately 12-18 months.
- Policy objectives may be national or subnational and have broader regional or global influence.
- Applicants must demonstrate that the grant will help address an opportunity and that there are clear benefits or reasons for the need to secure funding.
- Applicants should focus on a specific policy campaign rather than working across multiple policy priorities.
- Applicants with experience carrying out advocacy campaigns for policy change are a plus.
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Critical Considerations to Guide Your Application
- GHAI recognizes the benefits of working in a coalition or collaboration and encourages joint applications from organizations with a standard policy goal. At times, GHAI has been able to fund the work of teams of 2-4 organizations via one or more funded grantees in the same country/region.
- GHAI also encourages novel/innovative approaches to address food policy priorities. If there is a novel/innovative element to your proposal, please be sure to describe this in your application.
- When assessing concept notes, GHAI will consider the following criteria:
- Quality of the proposal
- Geography and population size
- Timebound political opportunity
- Strength of organization(s) (i.e., advocacy and institutional capacity)
- Innovation of approach and/or policy
- Several organizations support the campaign (coalition work is highly encouraged when relevant).
Who Cannot Apply
The Advocacy Fund will not accept:
- Applicants based in high-income countries.
- Applicants based in any of the Food Policy Program’s Focus countries (Barbados, Brazil, Colombia, Jamaica, Mexico and South Africa).
- Applicants that currently receive or have received funding within the last three years from any manufacturer or wholesaler of ultra-processed foods or sugar-sweetened beverages or from any entity that represents the interests of this industry.
- Applicants focused on research or policy evaluation.
- Finally, applicants should note that grant funds cannot be used to support or oppose candidates for elected office.
Note: Organizations from Ethiopia, Nigeria, India, Bangladesh, China, Vietnam, Philippines and Thailand (priority countries of the Bloomberg Philanthropies Cardiovascular Health (CVH) Program) can apply and will be evaluated by GHAI through the formal review process and referred to the CVH Program for their consideration on potential funding.
How to Apply for GHAI Healthy Food Policy Advocacy Fund.
- All applicants should complete the concept note form on the HERE online platform. Please complete all fields and submit before September 4, 2023, at 5 p.m. EST.
- Please find a Word version of the Concept Note HERE so that you can draft your responses before submitting them to the online platform.
- For general questions regarding the Advocacy Fund, including the application process, please get in touch with healthyfoodpolicy@advocacyincubator.org
Review Process
All concept notes are assessed and scored by a committee of external reviewers who are food policy advocates and researchers. Decisions on submissions and invitations for a full proposal will be issued between November and December 2023.
