Building Economic IncLUsion via the BlUe Economy (BELUU) Innovation Grant

UPDATE: First round of winners of the Innovation Grant have been selected

The BELUU Innovation Grant is an award and funding facility providing financial and technical assistance in Tuvalu, Nauru, Marshall Islands, and Palau to pilot or scale up projects, products and services that meet the needs of underserved women entrepreneurs, young professionals, youth groups and entrepreneurs for their business growth and resilience. Each country shall have at least one (1) Innovation Grant recipient. The Innovation Grant is open to any project or product that serves and supports women or youth. These may include products or services that utilize digital financial services or digital platforms and tools because of their potential to reach underserved rural and urban women at scale. Each funded Innovation project will last 6 to 18 months. The objective of the Innovation Grant is as follows:

• Contribute to the building of an enabling environment for WEE by fostering competition, and enhancing the capacity of country-level stakeholders from civil society and the private sector to offer gender-transformative access to services that improve the growth and resilience of women's businesses in blue and green economic sectors.
• Support women to succeed in their local economy by facilitating their access to necessary skills, mentorship, resilience planning for business and other external shocks, access to resources like financial services, market entry points and networks, by partnering equitably with women entrepreneurs and the civil society, private sector, and public organizations that are active participants in the market ecosystem.
• Increase underserved women entrepreneurs’ access to financial products and services for business growth, through the development of financial products and services that enable them to start new businesses, expand their existing businesses, or effectively sustain their existing businesses through crises and shocks

All applicants may choose from any of the two grant funding categories:

• Category 1: Small to Medium (10,000 to 15,000 USD)
• Category 2: Large (40,000 to 55,000 USD)

Each will have a set timeline, maximum budget, and corresponding scope of activities. Applicants are encouraged to choose the funding category based on their organization/individual capacity, experience in fund management and past project implementation with similar or same grant size.