Call for Proposals 2025: Central Sahel & Lake Chad Basin

Announcement of selected concept notes and next steps.

Concept Note Selection – Consortium led by International NGOs

As part of the 2025 Call for Proposals for the Central Sahel and Lake Chad Basin, 57 concept notes were submitted for funding to the Sahel Regional Fund (SRF).

These concept notes were evaluated by a committee of 15 members, including external technical experts, members of the SRF team, and representatives from the regional office of DRC (an organisation statutorily ineligible to apply for SRF funding). This multidisciplinary committee conducted the review using a predefined evaluation grid, ensuring a rigorous, fair, and strategically aligned selection process. The procedure was formally approved by the SRF Board of Directors on 27 May 2025.

The following 10 international NGOs (consortium leads) have been selected and are now invited to submit a full proposal no later than Sunday, 29 June 2025 at 11:59 p.m. GMT to the following address: tender@sahelregionalfund.org.

Action Contre la Faim (ACF)
ACTED
Catholic Relief Services (CRS)
International Rescue Committee (IRC)
INTERSOS
Médecins du Monde - Belgium
Mercy Corps
Norwegian Church Aid (NCA)
Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC)
Save The Children

The templates required for submitting full proposals can be downloaded below.

The SRF has also recently published two guidance notes:

One on localisation in international projects funded by the SRF;
And the other on the learning approach expected within supported projects.

These documents are also available for download below and must be taken into account when drafting full proposals.

Please note that the SRF's "Global Indicator Reference Sheet" is currently being updated. The revised version will be published very soon on the website.

Full proposals will be reviewed during the second evaluation phase, which will take place in the first half of July 2025. As in the first phase, the final results will be submitted to the SRF Board of Directors in anonymised form for validation.

Organisations whose projects are selected will be notified of the results around the second half of July, with contracting expected between August and September 2025.

The SRF wishes to thank all participating organisations for their work and contributions.