The African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) is a Pan-African feminist fund that resources, strengthens and upholds women’s rights and feminist organisations and movements across Africa, in order to make gender justice a reality for all on our continent and worldwide.

For this Call for Applications, there are 5 types of grants to choose from according to the area of work and goal of your application. Below are the 5 types of grants;

•  Inua Grants:
  This grant will support initiatives that strengthen the voice, agency and leadership of women, girls and gender-diverse people to lead actions that contribute to gender justice. Organisations, networks, movements and collectives led by women, girls and gender-diverse persons registered and working on the African continent.
• Siza Grants : This crisis response grant provides flexible funding to small grassroots and unregistered groups in building sustainable solutions in crisis and conflict areas. It will support responses before, during and after crises. Nascent or small grassroots organisations and networks and unregistered groups and networks led by African women, girls and gender-diverse persons in countries and communities experiencing conflict. Priority will be given to organisations and unregistered groups that focus on women’s health, femicide, domestic violence, sexual violence and other forms of violence against women, and women, peace and security issues.
• Matla Grants: This grant aims to support delivery of essential services to women, girls and gender diverse persons experiencing violence, backlash and/or discrimination Organisations and groups led by African women, girls and gender diverse persons that provide essential services such as shelter, psychosocial and legal services to women, girls, and gender-diverse individuals facing violence, backlash, and various forms of abuse and discrimination. Emerging and small registered and unregistered groups can apply.
• Economic Justice Grants: This grant will resource organisations to dismantle the barriers to economic justice and equality for African women by reimagining economies, and rethinking mechanisations, craft, and intellectual knowledge from micro to macro level. Registered and unregistered groups and networks keen on holding spaces and dialogue; influencing agenda setting, advocacy and macroeconomic policy engagement in Africa are encouraged to apply. This grant is not recommended for partners implementing livelihoods and income generation initiatives. Examples of the areas this economic justice grant portfolio will prioritise include (but are not limited to) African feminist solutions like ecofeminism, advancing gendered tax justice, public procurement, debt and care economies.
• Zimba Grants: This will support capacity strengthening and movement building in French-speaking Africa only. Girl-led movements, organisations and collectives led by African women and gender diverse persons organising in non-traditional ways (like creatives and artists among others) located in French-speaking African countries only. The grants will support feminist political consciousness-raising, feminist education, feminist campaigns and amplifying feminist voice, networking, coalition building and Institutional capacity strengthening, among others in French-speaking Africa only.

Please note that you can only submit one application. Please choose one of the 5 types of grants. AWDF will only consider one application per organisation.

No. AWDF will not consider applications for organisations that are not based and headquartered in Africa and/or organisations that are not led by African women (senior staff and Board).

No. AWDF will only consider applications from organisations where the Director or Chief Executive Officer of the organisation and Chairperson of the Board identify as female or gender-diverse and where the majority, (at least 70%), of all staff and board identify as female or gender-diverse

Yes, AWDF supports both registered and non registered organisations, groups and collectives depending on the type of grant publicised. Please carefully read the call for proposals document for information on the type of organisations that are eligible to apply for that particular call for proposals.

Yes, AWDF does consider applications from CBOs if they meet all our eligibility criteria.

No. AWDF does not fund profit making entities or organisations.

If your current grant ends before 31 st July 2025, you can submit an application to any of the five grant types available for this cycle. If your current grant ends after 31 st July 2025, you cannot submit an application for this round. You however will be eligible to apply for any other call for proposals that AWDF puts out in 2025.

If the previous grant from AWDF has ended and there are no outstanding contractual obligations, you can apply. If you have a live grant that ends before 31 st July 2025, you can apply. If you have a current grant that ends after 31 st July 2025, you are not able to apply for any of the available grant types in this cycle. You however, will be eligible to apply for any other call for proposals that AWDF puts out in 2025.

Yes. AWDF welcomes applications that are for work delivered by more than one partner organisation as long as the application is submitted by one partner and all the named partners meet all the eligibility criteria. If you are submitting an application for a consortium project or more than two organisations, we will consider the eligibility and income of only the applicant organisation and not the combined income of all the proposed partners. We do also accept applications from organisations that are not working with partners.

Yes. AWDF will consider multi-country applications as long as the rationale for working across more than one country is clear and strategic with well-defined and measurable impact in each country.

An applicant can apply for only 50% of their previous year’s income. For example, if the 2024 income of the applicant was USD60,000, the applicant can apply for up to a maximum of USD30,000 per year. If the 2024 income of the applicant was USD40,000, the applicant can apply for up to a maximum of USD20,000 per year.

Not all applicants are required to submit a financial account. For applications that require a financial account, AWDF will accept either audited accounts or unaudited accounts signed by management. If your 2024 accounts have not yet been audited or independently verified, we will accept your 2024 unaudited accounts signed by management. If your last audited accounts were for 2023, please submit your management approved accounts for 2024.

Because of bank transfer restrictions by the Government of Ghana imposed by the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and others, AWDF is unable to transfer funds to Sudan, and South Sudan. Women’s Rights Organisations in these countries, if successful, can consider entering into agreement with other Women’s Rights Organisations in eligible countries to act as fiscal sponsors for their grant.

AWDF’s call for proposals will be launched on the 28th of April 2025 and will be open until the deadline at 11.59PM/23.59 GMT on 27th May 2025.

AWDF typically receives up to 1000 applications during each funding cycle and we have a robust process to consider each one. All applications that meet our eligibility criteria and respond most closely to our stated priorities for the cycle are assessed by our Programmes Department. Following assessment of shortlisted applications, we request references on applicants, and compile reports on all shortlisted applications which our Board considers and makes the final decision on. All applicants will be notified of the status of their application by the end of August 2025.