Grant-Making

A country’s funding request to the Global Fund is turned into one or more grants through a process called grant-making. The Country Coordinating Mechanism and the Global Fund work with the partner implementing a grant, the Principal Recipient, to prepare the grant. The process sets out how and when a grant’s activities will be implemented and evaluated.

High-quality grants

Grant-making during the 2020-2022 cycle looks at lessons learned from past cycles for all partners to work together to develop high-quality grants. Particular focus is put on what can be done before grants are signed to enable swift implementation. Lessons learned include:

• Implementation readiness supports the achievement of grant targets and absorption of the predefined budget.
  Advanced preparations allow programmatic activities and the related use of funds to commence on the new implementation period start date. Preparations include the early identification and contracting of human resources, sub-recipients and suppliers of health products, as well as agreeing on the work plan for the first year of implementation.
• Setting deliverables and timelines at the beginning of the process, to allow Principal Recipients to prepare for implementation.
  As early as the funding request phase, all partners plan and agree on a project plan that will cover the grant-making deliverables, key milestones and timelines.
• Confirming human resources at grant-making stage to avoid delays in implementation of the new grant.
  For continuing grants, the Global Fund Secretariat and Principal Recipients work to identify the human resources the Principal Recipient needs to simultaneously finalize implementation and start closure of the current implementation period and complete grant-making and preparation for the next period.
• Accelerating grant-making, to be ready to implement the new grant in a timely manner.
  Early negotiations and work on detailed grant documents will reduce the overall time spent from funding request to grant-signing.
• Accurate, clear and concise Performance Frameworks and Budgets.
  Focused Performance Frameworks and Budgets enable quality and timely implementation and monitoring. They balance the need for detail while also enabling easy reporting and/or revisions during implementation.

Guidance

Guidance, instructions and templates are available on the specific elements of grant-making.

See Funding Request Applications for more information and documents on elements of grant-making that are initiated during funding request development.

Budget

Strong financial management increases the ability of Global Fund implementers to achieve greater impact against HIV, tuberculosis and malaria. The Global Fund offers a variety of budgeting resources for implementers, including for use during grant-making.

See Financial Management for more information and documents.

Monitoring and evaluation

The Global Fund requires a performance framework that outlines the indicators and targets the implementer aims to achieve and a monitoring and evaluation plan that outlines how they intend to collect, collate and analyze the data from programs in order to see if they are, in fact, reaching the envisioned impact.

See Monitoring and Evaluation for more information and documents.