EFJ moves to support technology in forest education
New call for proposals includes offer for app, game developers
THE ENVIRONMENTAL Foundation of Jamaica (EFJ) has turned its attention to the use of technology to advance public education and awareness about the environment, with the offer of a grant to support developers of educational applications and games that teach children about forest ecosystems.
The offer forms a part of the entity’s latest call for proposals, which opens tomorrow and closes on March 29.
“The funding source for this thematic area is t he Forest Conservation Fund hence the skew towards forests. We went the route of App development to encourage the younger generation to become more knowledgeable about forests,” Barrington Lewis, chief executive officer of the EFJ, told The Gleaner.
“The apps should be easy to install on mobile devices that a wide cross section of people have access to; especially the ‘Gen Z’ cohort. This area also seamlessly twins the EFJ’s dual mandate of the environment and child sector,” he added.
This latest call for proposals from the EFJ – a grant-making institution set up to provide funding to non-governmental organisations (NGOs) involved with the management and sustainable use of Jamaica’s natural resources – also includes the offer of financial support in a number of other thematic areas.
Those areas include ‘Alternative Livelihoods’, ‘Climate Change Resilience ’,‘ Eco-tourism Development’, as well as ‘Invasive species control, research and monitoring and water resources protection’ – all through the Forest Conservation Fund.
The EFJ is also making grants available through the Special Climate Change Adaptation Fund for ‘Climate Smart Building’, ‘Climate Smart Agro-business’, ‘Climate Resilient Cropping Systems’, Renewable Energy Systems for increasing resilience to Climate Change, and ‘Water Management’.
In commenting on the areas of focus for this call, Lewis said they had been determined on the basis of the available resources matched against new and emergent or otherwise prevailing needs.
“The choice of areas is informed from a series of factors, [notably] the available funding sources; in this case we have Forest Conservation Fund and Climate Change Adaptation Fund. The funding source gives broad guidelines for the thematic areas; while the thematic areas are based on feedback from the sector, the strategic focus of the EFJ, and injecting novel thinking into the work of the EFJ and having the biggest sector impact,” he noted.
Specific criteria for approval include that proposals align with national priorities; and deal with systematic issues and produce replicable and/or sustainable results. The entity is also encouraging collaboration and partnerships in project design and implementation together with appropriate budgets. App and game developers must be aligned to a NGO.
Further, climate adaptation projects should be no more than one year while protected areas/ watershed conservation projects should run for no more than three years.
In 2022, the EFJ awarded some $85 million in grants, $25 million in climate change adaptation grants and $60 million in Forest Conservation Fund grants. The Forest Conservation Fund grants were to assist with capacity building and the purchase of fixed assets for NGOs.
“These grants were a way of ensuring the longevity of some of the NGOs, especially on the heels of the pandemic and the lack of donor funding,” Lewis noted.