City of Oakley Small Business Recovery Grant Program

The United States Department of State's Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs (WHA) is offering a Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) through its Caribbean United for Women's Economic Empowerment (CUWEE) project. This initiative aligns with the foundation's mission to address systemic barriers and socio-cultural attitudes that hinder gender equity and equality in the Caribbean economy. The project aims to build the economic resilience and skills capacity of women and adolescent girls aged 16 and older, enabling them to enter the labor force and achieve economic security. This cooperative agreement, administered by WHA's Office of Policy Planning and Coordination (PPC), underscores a commitment to fostering economic opportunities for women in the region. The primary target beneficiaries of this grant program are women and adolescent girls aged 16 and older in the Caribbean. The impact goal is to enhance their economic security and facilitate their entry into the labor force by addressing the underlying challenges they face. The CUWEE project seeks proposals that demonstrate how potential grantees will strengthen local civil society support actors engaged in advancing women's economic security, thereby contributing to economic gender equity and equality across the Caribbean. The program's priorities and focuses include, first, identifying problematic country-specific and/or regional systemic barriers and socio-cultural attitudes that impede women's economic empowerment. Following this identification, the project will work with local Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) to address these barriers. A key focus is to support a competition that promotes local CSOs in developing and implementing pioneering solutions tailored to overcome the specific local systemic obstacles to economic security for women in their respective countries or regions. Expected outcomes include a strengthened regional Caribbean network of local CSOs engaged in women's economic security, equipped with enhanced capacity through a provided training curriculum. Measurable results will stem from the effective implementation of these pioneering solutions by CSOs, leading to a tangible improvement in the economic security and labor force participation of women and adolescent girls. The overall strategic priority is to advance gender equity and equality, with a theory of change rooted in empowering local CSOs to drive sustainable, community-specific interventions against systemic and socio-cultural barriers.