SGP COUNTRY PROGRAMME STRATEGY FOR OP7 REPUBLIC OF BELARUS 1 Table of Content 1. INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................................................ 3 2. BACKGROUND .......................................................................................................................................... 3 2.1 SUMMARY: Key Results/Accomplishments ............................................................................................ 3 3. COUNTRY PRIORITIES AND STRATEGIC ALIGNMENT ................................................................................... 5 3.1 Alignment with National Priorities ......................................................................................................... 5 3.2 Gaps and Opportunities ......................................................................................................................... 6 3.3 OP7 Strategic Priorities of the SGP Country Programme ....................................................................... 8 4. OP7 PRIORITY LANDSCAPES/SEASCAPES & STRATEGIC INITIATIVES ......................................................... 15 4.1 Grantmaking Within the Priority Landscape/Seascapes ...................................................................... 15 a) Process for selecting priority landscapes and seascapes. Selected Landscapes/Seascapes for OP7 15 b) OP7 Strategic Initiatives in the landscapes/seascapes ...................................................................... 18 4.2 Grantmaking Outside the Priority Landscapes/Seascapes ................................................................... 20 a) CSO-Government-Private Sector Dialogue Platform ......................................................................... 20 b) Promoting Social Inclusion, including gender equality and women’s empowerment ...................... 20 c) SGP Belarus synergy with UNDP Social and Environmental Standards. ............................................ 23 d) Knowledge Management ................................................................................................................... 24 5. COMMUNICATION PLAN ............................................................................................................................ 25 6. RESOURCE MOBILIZATION AND PARTNERSHIP PLAN ................................................................................ 25 6.1 Secured and planned cash and in-kind co-financing ............................................................................ 25 Cofinancing Opportunities ..................................................................................................................... 25 6.2 Grantmaker Plus & Partnership Opportunities .................................................................................... 26 7. RISK MANAGEMENT PLAN ......................................................................................................................... 27 8. MONITORING AND EVALUATION PLAN ..................................................................................................... 28 8.1 Monitoring Approaches at Project and Country Levels ....................................................................... 28 8.2 CPS Results Framework ........................................................................................................................ 31 9. NATIONAL STEERING COMMITTEE ENDORSEMENT .................................................................................. 41 2 1. INTRODUCTION OP7 Financial Resources - SGP Country Programme (estimated US$)1 Total SGP Grants to date since 2005: 160 USD $ 6,393,125.00 OP7 GEF Core Funds: USD $ 500,000. 00 OP7 GEF STAR Funds: USD $ 1.000.000 US$ OP6 GEF Core and STAR remaining balance (if applicable) 100,000.00 USD Other funds (secured) USD Other funds (expected/to be mobilized) USD 2. BACKGROUND As a corporate programme of the Global Environment Facility (GEF), the GEF Small Grants Programme (SGP), implemented by United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) aligns its Operational Phase strategies with those of the GEF and cofinancing partners, and provides a global portfolio of innovative, inclusive, and impactful projects that address global environmental and sustainable development issues. Action at the local level by civil society and community-based organizations, including women groups, indigenous peoples, youth, and persons with disabilities is recognized essential to form multi-stakeholder alliances to deliver global environmental benefits and contribute to the GEF-7 Programming Directions, UNDP’s Strategic Plan 2018-2021, and national priorities to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals and other international commitments.2 Building on its over 26 years of successful operations in total over 133 countries, the 7th Operational Phase of the SGP aims “to promote and support innovative, inclusive and scalable initiatives, and foster multi stakeholder partnerships at the local level to tackle global environmental issues in priority landscapes and seascapes.” 2.1 SUMMARY: KEY RESULTS/ACCOMPLISHMENTS GEF SGP is recognized as one of the leaders among international donor organizations operating in Belarus since January 2005. It promotes local empowerment, mobilizes local resources to solve community problems, and helps communities develop their capacities to address environmental problems by managing project resources. GEF SGP seeks to increase participation and enhance responsibility of communities for their decisions and to encourage them to share costs, with the ultimate objective to ensure a long-term sustainability and a high multiplier effect of the efforts. The project strategies are based on sustainable 1 The level of SGP OP7 resources is an estimated total of: (i) the GEF7 core grant allocation (to be reviewed annually by CPMT on the basis of performance, co-financing and strategic partnerships, demonstrated NSC commitment rates, and UNOPS delivery); (ii) approved STAR resources; as well as (iii) other sources of third party cost sharing & co-financing (country, regional and/or global levels). SGP countries with remaining OP6 balances that have not been pipelined will be expected to use these balances in line with the OP7 strategic approach in order to be coherent in terms of SGP programming and results expected. 2 The initial SGP OP7 concept was incorporated into the strategic directions for the overall GEF-7 replenishment negotiations in 2017, and subsequently approved by the GEF Council paper “GEF Small Grants Programme: Implementation Arrangements for GEF-7” (GEF/C.54/05.rev) in June 2018. 3 development concepts as well as UN SDGs: to maintain the balance between human economic and social needs and environmental imperatives. Since 2006, GEF SGP in Belarus has supported 160 pilot projects (Table 1) ($6,393,125.00 GEF resources) and total co-financing from different donors is $8,078,852.00. During this period 97 CSOs and 63 CBOs received the above grant support from the GEF SGP. The majority of them aim to respond to various challenges and to adapt to climate change (51 % of the total). Considerable resources have been directed to preserve biodiversity (13 %) and to build up capacities of local communities in implementing environmental actions (6 %) (Fig. 1). About 9 % of the projects aim to combat land degradation and persistent organic pollutants (chemicals) and to protect international watercourses. The distribution pattern of the GEF SGP resources across the focal areas is similar to that of the supported projects (Fig. 2). The GEF SGP funds (up to $50,000 per project) empower local communities to implement specific projects and achieve desirable results. More than that, by allocating funds for community action GEF SGP also helps mobilize additional resources. As a rule, GEF SGP encourages beneficiaries to make an equal contribution. Thereby, the average project amount is in the range from $75,000 to $150,000. The implementation of the Strategy of the SGP Belarus for the GEF OP6 had a significant impact on the development and implementation of the principles of sustainable development in the selected landscape. An analysis of project activities on the Belarus SGP OP6 landscape territory up to 2019 showed that until 2016, significant resources of international assistance were aimed at improving the children’s health from settlements affected by the Chernobyl accident. In 2016-2019, allocated resources from different donors were directed to initiatives to solve numerous environmental problems and to raise the well-being of local population as well as to support rural entrepreneurship, to non-formal adult education. In OP7, SGP Belarus is expected to receive US$500,000 from the GEF Core funds for grant making across five GEF focal areas. In addition, the country programme has US$1.000, 000 envisaged from OP7 STAR resources for climate change mitigation thematic area. Experience, knowledge and partnerships of past operational phases will serve as a foundation for effective use of SGP resources in OP7. Taking into account that partnerships is critical for SGP implementation both in technical and financial terms, the country programme will further strive to maintain and expand existing partnership relations with bilateral and multilateral donors, UN agencies, as well as private sector and government for complementarity and cost-sharing opportunities addressing the linkages between environment and poverty in OP7