The SGSIP Fund was designed to help develop small-scale ICT-based initiatives and pilot projects on the ground that address poverty reduction, womens empowerment, youth participation and indigenous, marginalised or displaced communities. The Fund is currently closed for evaluation and will not be open for applications until further notice. To find out more about why and how the Fund was started, please read on.

Rationale, Facts and Figures
GKP recognised that there was a huge lack of small-scale grants for organisations to support innovative initiatives that use ICT for improving the lives of women, the poor, youth, and indigenous, marginalised or displaced communities, particularly at local and national levels.

The SGSIP Fund was launched to meet this unfulfilled need. It provided funding of up to a maximum of USD15,000 to small or locally-based organisations in developing countries for pilot projects, or new or ongoing small-scale initiatives, that could contribute to the achievement of one or both of the following objectives:

• Facilitate innovation using information and communication technologies (ICT) from the ground-up to further strengthen and promote the growth and maturity of civil society participation in the Information Society.

• Promote and facilitate the fertilisation of multi-stakeholder partnerships for the upscaling and/or replication of small-scale and community-based initiatives.

The SGSIP Fund also considered ongoing small-scale initiatives that were limited to only the identification and development of specific project components deemed urgent to complement or strengthen efforts to achieve the overall project's original objectives.

GKP opened the SGSIP Fund for project proposals in 2003 and received over 685 queries of interest, with final applications numbering 560 in total. Forty-one proposals were short-listed for final review. In 2004, GKP increased the initial Fund amount from US$100,000 to US$200,000 and reduced the size of each grant awarded from US$25,000 to US$15,000 to enable more grants to be made given the high number of worthwhile applicants. In that year, GKP received 934 Letter of Inquiries and short listed 36 for request for final proposal.

Merits and Value
The SGSIP Fund was launched at a time when it was most needed by its targeted recipients, particularly civil society organisations, as reflected by the high numbers of project proposals that GKP received in 2003 and 2004.

GKP has been instrumental in championing the multi-stakeholder partnership approach and in fostering and facilitating such partnerships. By supporting small-scale initiatives and pilot projects, GKP is able to play a catalytic role in spearheading ICT innovation from the ground-up, as well as in designing and promoting a variety of multi-stakeholder partnerships, linking the disadvantaged or resource-poor with the advantaged or resource-rich, thereby advancing disadvantaged development stakeholders at the local level from an un-equitable position to one of equal standing.

In future, GKP aims to increase the SGSIP Fund to at least USD1 million as there are still many worthwhile projects that could not be supported due to overwhelming demand for such funding. GKP invites support from sponsors and donors to help achieve this goal in order to facilitate widespread ICT innovation and multi-stakeholder partnerships at the local level on a global scale.

Past Recipients
The four following projects were awarded grants under Seed Grant and Small Innovative Projects Fund in 2003:

• ICTs for Poverty Reduction

Fantsuam Foundation, Nigeria, in the amount of US$25,000 for Capacity-building for women and youth operators for Nigerias first rural ISP

• ICT and Womens Empowerment

PROTÉGÉ QV, Cameroon, in the amount of US$16,700 for Improving Rural Development in the Upper Nkam Division in Cameroon through Open and Distance Training Programme for Rural Women

• ICT for Youth Participation

Rural Development Volunteers Association (RDVA), Solomon Islands, in the amount of US$25,000 for ICT Resource Centre for Schools and Youth Participation

• ICT and Indigenous/Displaced Communities

Promedios de Communicacion Comunitaria A.C, Mexico, in the amount of US$25,000 for their pilot project to establish two Regional Media Centres

Status of Fund
The SGSIP Fund will no longer be offered in its original form. GKP has migrated the principles and learning outcomes of this fund into its Strategy 2010 Programme Framework, which is tied to a limited funding mechanism. All projects contemplated for funding by GKP will now only be considered through the Strategy 2010 Programme Framework, namely as Regional Partnership Projects (RPPs) via the Regional Workplans, or as Global Partnership Projects spearheaded by the GKP Secretariat.