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Calls for Proposals: Greater Horn of Africa – Strengthening Community Based early warning and early action systems for meteorological, hydrological and climate extremes- Sudan

City/location:
Sudan
Organization:
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR)

This job posting has closed

UNDRR is the United Nations' focal point for coordinating disaster risk reduction, working closely with countries and a wide range of partners and stakeholders to support the implementation, monitoring, and review of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030. This work is aligned with the 2030 Agenda and other relevant instruments, with the ultimate goal of achieving multi-hazard management of disaster risk in development and significantly reducing disaster risk and losses.

In accordance with UN Financial Regulations and Rules, UNDRR provides grants to apolitical and non-profit-making organizations to facilitate, implement, or carry out activities that align with UNDRR's and its partners' mandates and work programs.

To this end, UNDRR invites non-profit-making organisations to submit grant proposals that focus on the project described below.

Greater Horn of Africa - Strengthening Community Based early warning and early action systems for meteorological, hydrological and climate extremes- Sudan

Background:

Climate change presents the single biggest threat to sustainable development everywhere, and its widespread and unprecedented impacts disproportionately burden the poorest and most vulnerable. Safeguarding people most at risk, as well as protecting assets, infrastructure, ecosystems, and social services, animates UNDRR efforts to scale up disaster risk reduction, including improving last-mile access to early warning services and the governance, technical and financial systems that underpin them. Advances in early warning systems and disaster risk awareness have saved tens of thousands of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars. People-centered early-warning systems can help minimize the harm to people, assets, and livelihoods by triggering early action that is well prepared and tested. Yet, only half of countries globally are protected by multi-hazard early warning systems.

Launched in 2022 by United Nations Secretary-General, António Guterres, Early Warnings for All is a groundbreaking initiative to ensure that everyone on Earth is protected from hazardous weather, water, or climate events through life-saving early warning systems by the end of 2027. Early warning systems are urgently needed as climate change is causing more frequent and intense extreme weather events, resulting in widespread adverse impacts and related losses and damages to nature and people. Early warning systems are a proven, efficient, and cost-effective way to save lives and jobs, land and infrastructure, and support long-term sustainability. More lives are being protected from extreme weather and dangerous climate change impacts, but there is a long way to go. One out of three people, mainly in least developed countries and small island developing states, lack access to adequate multi-hazard early warning systems. As a call to scale up national action, Early Warnings for All (EW4All) can play a crucial role in accelerating investment to address countries' vulnerability to climate change by improving early warning systems and enhancing resilience. EW4All is built on four pillars that are the cornerstones of the initiative and of effective multi-hazard early warning.

  • Disaster risk knowledge and management: aiming to collect data and undertake risk assessments to increase knowledge on hazards and vulnerabilities and trends (led by UNDRR)
  • Detection, observation, monitoring, analysis, and forecasting: developing hazard monitoring and early warning services (led by WMO)
  • Warning dissemination and communication: communicating risk information so it reaches all those who need it, and is understandable and usable (led by ITU)
  • Preparedness and response: building national and community response capabilities (led by IFRC)

Early warning systems (EWS) integrate hazard monitoring, forecasting and prediction, disaster risk assessment, communication, and preparedness, response and recovery activities, and related processes that enable individuals, communities, governments, businesses and others to take timely action to reduce disaster risks in advance of hazardous events manifesting into disasters.

To be effective, risk knowledge requires a deep and locally-grounded understanding by national actors of hazard-specific exposures, vulnerabilities, livelihood and social dynamics, losses, damages and impacts, among other important aspects to contextualize local risk trends. This risk knowledge is not just the domain of experts but is most impactful when incorporating all forms of knowledge, from indigenous to scientific, and with a focus on understanding risk from the perspective of those who are most vulnerable and have agency to take mitigative action to minimize their susceptibility to losses and damages.

While risk knowledge underpins early warning systems, it is also essential to advance impact-based forecasting (IBF) to better inform people how to take safeguard action. As the economic and human impacts of extreme weather and climate change increase, forecasts not just of what the weather will be, but of what the weather will do are vital to save lives and livelihoods. With increasing global warming, losses and damages will increase and additional human and natural systems will reach hard and soft adaptation limits.

Sudan: Country context

Sudan is highly vulnerable to the impact of climate change with a rank of 179 (out of 185) in the ND-GAIN index[1]. By 2060, temperatures are expected to rise by 1.5°C to 2.6°C in Sudan. The IPCC AR6 report predicts that river flooding could cause a huge increase in displacement in sub-Saharan Africa, including Sudan, by the late 21st century, especially if temperatures rise significantly and populations grow. Such an increase in temperature will lead to increased water insecurity,[2] increased food insecurity and reduced social cohesion. Sudan has faced significant challenges due to both floods and droughts over the past several decades, resulting in severe human and economic repercussions. Flooding has impacted 17 of Sudan's 18 states in recent years, damaging agricultural lands and infrastructure. The floods of 2020, caused by persistent rainfall, affected over 3 million people, destroyed more than 100,000 homes, and resulted in approximately 100 fatalities. Historically, the devastating floods of 1988 led to widespread destruction and displaced over 1 million people. More recently, in 2024, heavy rains resulted in floods that impacted various regions, destroying over 12,000 homes and damaging around 198,000 feddans (approximately 205,500 acres) of farmland, further deepening the humanitarian crisis amid ongoing conflicts.

In addition to the flooding crisis, Sudan has experienced severe droughts, particularly in the 1970s and 1980s, which prompted the migration of millions to southern agricultural areas. Over the span from 1970 to 2020, droughts affected over 27 million people. Furthermore, between 1941 and 2000, the average annual rainfall decreased by 0.5% per year, leading to increasing unpredictability in rainfall patterns. Regions such as Kordofan and Darfur, along with central Sudan, have seen a rise in the frequency of extreme climatic events like droughts.

Sudan's early warning services for climate-related disasters have been scattered involving several institutions with overlapping functions. In 2022, key organizations-including meteorological authorities, the Ministry of Irrigation and Water Resources, and the National Council for Civil Defense-came together to form the Hydro-Met Working Group. This initiative aims to create integrated National Meteorological and Hydrological Services with the support of the CIMA Research Foundation. Additionally, in 2024, the Water at heart under Climate Action project, funded by the Netherlands government, aided national disaster management actors in developing early warning systems and anticipatory action for vulnerable communities.

Despite these initiatives, the frequency and magnitude of climate-related disasters have intensified, as evidenced by the devastating floods of 2020 and 2024, which continue to impact millions of people. Projections suggest that climate change could lead to a staggering 600% increase in displacement in Sudan by 2096, influenced by factors such as flooding, drought, and desertification. This anticipated rise in displacement will exacerbate existing social and economic vulnerabilities, highlighting the urgent need for a unified approach to disaster preparedness and response. Moreover, ongoing conflicts have severely damaged infrastructure, resulting in data loss and diminished operational capacity among institutions.

Since 15 April 2023, when the premises of the Sudan Meteorological Authority (SMA) became inaccessible due to the ongoing conflict, its staff - like millions of Sudanese citizens - have been displaced. Despite this, SMA personnel have maintained critical operations by working remotely from Port Sudan, Cairo, and Nairobi. This support was made possible through the rapid deployment of cloud-hosted infrastructure, supported by the CREWS Initiative, enabling the successful issuance of flood warnings during the conflict. Leveraging SMA's website, https://meteosudan.sd, CAP Composer, and social media channels, SMA has managed to alert the public to the danger of incoming floods.

The APIS project in Sudan, funded by the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation (AICS), aims to strengthen Sudan's early warning and civil protection capabilities for floods and droughts. Specifically, it focuses on implementing an operational warning system that reduces the impact of these extreme weather events. The project is implemented by CIMA Research Foundation, which the first phase completed in March 2023, including training, regulatory and institutional reviews of Sudan's warning system, and technical partnerships with WMO, ICPAC Nairobi and NORCAP. APIS supports the issuance of real-time Sudanese bulletins to organizations operating in the emergency context and focuses on aspects that most influence humanitarian activities such as the potential impact of extreme hydro meteorological events, like extreme rainfall and flooding, affecting the population. The service is supported by Sudanese staff using methodologies and procedures currently applied by the African Union Situation Room in Addis Ababa, within the framework of the continental warning system design.

Within the context of EW4All, partners continue to support the capacities and operations of the Sudanese meteorological service and National Council for Civil Defense (NCCD), in collaboration with the IGAD/ICPAC Disaster Operation Center in Nairobi and the WMO, for the restoration of essential services and the continuing delivery of institutional mandates for coordinating the national warning and forecasting system. The conflict in Sudan forced government offices and national and international NGOs to relocate their offices. The Government of Sudan, the Sudanese Red Crescent Society (SRCS), IFRC, many UN agencies and INGOs relocated their offices to Port Sudan. NLRC and WMO support their implementing partners from Nairobi, and UNDRR supports its implementing partner from Cairo.

In a 2025 survey covering approximately 2,400 households in 11 states across Sudan[3], 39% of respondents reported having access to weather and climate information or early warnings, of which only half understood sufficiently the content of the warning messages. Key government actors such as SMA, NCCD, and multiple humanitarian and community partners continue efforts to ensure diverse communities in the conflict affected country continue to receive, and take preparedness action based on, early warnings.

To this end, focus group discussions with farmers, displaced persons, and local media reaffirms the need to tailor forecasts to community needs, including localized language formats.

Against this background, UNDRR is prioritizing interventions to improve risk knowledge about multiple hazards[4] among Sudanese populations exposed and vulnerable to these threats. Improving community-based early warning and early action systems (CBEWS) in urban and peri-urban areas will ensure that ongoing upstream investments in safeguarding the hydromet operations and services are effectively translated into downstream applications which contribute to community resilience by increasing public awareness of natural hazards and fostering better reception and interpretation of alert messages by the general public.

Purpose:

The overall goal of this grant is to strengthen national and community capacities to improve people's access to, and understanding of, early warning messages so they may take risk-informed action in the face of extreme weather or other high-priority hazards in Sudan.

The grant will focus on ensuring that early warning messages are grounded in robust risk knowledge, and are co-created and contextualized, understood by communities and effectively acted upon. This will be done through understanding the information gaps and barriers at community level, improving the ability of communities to act upon early warning messages, and developing sub-national scale early action plans (EAPs) in target communities.

Notwithstanding the volatile context in Sudan owing to the conflict, two States are envisaged for prioritization: River Nile State and Northern State. Indicative areas under this grant include: Nadi (in Berber District), Al Sadabiya (in Shendi District), Al Gilaiaat (in the Al Matammah district) and Kalli (in the Atbara district). Applicants are invited to propose adjustments to these targets States and Areas, and/or propose other States and Areas feasible within the context of the resource envelope for this grant. Core criteria for target area selection is access, security, community demand, linkages to existing emergency weather and EWS services being provided by Sudan's development and humanitarian partners, and feasibility for achieving positive impacts and results for communities.

Expected outputs and activities:

The following outputs and indicative activities are envisaged under this multi-purpose grant:

  1. In the context of the foregoing, the grantee will develop an inception report outlining specific activities, milestones, target audiences, and expected results for the duration of this grant. The inception report is limited to 10 pages.
  2. Synthesis of up-to-date diagnostics respecting the barriers to and opportunities for effective community-based early warning and early action systems in Sudan, adopting an appreciative inquiry approach to define activities to improve CBEWS performance based on robust evidence of impact across communities. Applicants are invited to adopt a participatory methodology to solicit inputs from key informants in Sudan involved in the provision and use of emergency early warning services. Emphasis should be placed on how to improve the interface between the generation of warnings and their uptake by communities to inform preparedness, prevention and other mitigative actions to avoid loss and damage from extreme weather events. The synthesis report will inform the co-prioritization of training, sensitization, and other activities to be delivered in cooperation with target communities. Synthesis report is limited to 15 pages and represents approximately 10% of grant resources.
  3. In collaboration with the IGAD Climate Prediction and Applications Centre (ICPAC), NCCD, SMA and other national and regional partners, strengthen the evidence base for Community Early Action Protocols by co-defining warning thresholds for impact-based forecasts (IbF) based on evidence of loss and damage risk to assets, services, and infrastructure in the target areas, including tailored messaging to communities about effective mitigative actions which could be adopted. Development of up to four CEAPs is envisaged under this grant, representing 20% of grant resources.
  4. Associated with item (C) above, undertake risk data collation, rescue and synthesis of community-level loss and damage information, synthesis of effective community-led mitigative actions to avoid loss and damage (by hazard type). Grantee will consolidate findings and leverage the results to inform impact-based forecasting support being provided by Sudan's development and humanitarian partners. Represents 20% of grant resources.
  5. In cooperation with the new Situation Room of the National Council for Civil Defence (NCCD), SMA and other partners, the grantee will undertake actions to improve the understanding of diverse stakeholders in the target communities of the contents of NCCD and SMA bulletins to inform community-led preparedness and early actions. This activity represents 30% of grant resources.
  6. Improve risk understanding among government and non-government actors on tools, approaches and applications for multi-hazard risk assessment by conducting two tailored trainings targeting 30 participants each (to be convened in Port Sudan or Nairobi subject to security clearances). This activity represents 20% of grant resources.

Indicative resources

Elements specific to the project that the grantee should know:

All International and national non-governmental organizations that wish to be considered for partnership opportunities with UNDRR will need to register and create a profile on the United Nations Partner Portal (UNPP). Following verification of the profile information, partners will be eligible to apply to partnership opportunities with UNDRR as well as the UN Secretariat and all other participating UN Organizations.

We encourage you to start the registration as soon as possible to avoid delays. Only registered organizations whose profile has been successfully verified will be considered eligible partners to apply for grant opportunities with UNDRR.

For more details on registration procedures please visit the UN Section of UNPP.

Furthermore, the United Nations system requires all partners to be assessed regarding their capacity to prevent and respond to sexual exploitation and abuse. UNDRR encourages implementing partners to use the Protection from Sexual Exploitation and Abuse (PSEA) module in the UNPP. PSEA Module User Guide CSO Partner Members

The application should demonstrate the following requirements:

  • The grantee must have a proven track record in working with government authorities, both at the national and local levels with experience in risk data aggregation to improve early warning and impact-based forecasting [Mandatory].
  • The grantee must have a proven track record in working with communities on early warning and early action protocols, identification and promotion of locally-relevant disaster preparedness and early action to avoid loss and damage, and experience in community engagement, data synthesis and evidence-based advocacy [Mandatory].
  • For all training, workshops, consultative meetings, etc., grantee must provide a summary outcome of the events, list of participants with disaggregate information including names, affiliation, gender, email address, city, and country of representation. All events must be accompanied by relevant reports with photos as proof of evidence [Mandatory].

Applicant to note that activities of the project are intended to be delivered in Sudan and require travel to Sudan.

Budget and administrative-related aspects

The duration of the proposed project cannot exceed 16 months. The maximum amount requested from UNDRR for the implementation of this project cannot exceed 250,000 USD. The project proposal must not exceed 10 pages (attachments such as scanned copies of entity's registration, CVs of staff etc. do not count).

For this purpose, please fill in duly all the sections of the application form, include the required documents (scanned copy of NGO/IGO's registration certificate, CVs of staff etc.) and budget excel sheets, and send the complete application package (application form, budget excel sheets, entity registration certificate, CVs of staff, etc.) to the following email address: [email protected] cc: [email protected] and [email protected].

Reference: CfP 2025 002- Greater Horn of Africa - Strengthening Community Based early warning and early action systems for meteorological, hydrological and climate extremes- Sudan

Deadline for applications: 31 July 2025, midnight New York, USA EST (Eastern Standard Time). Incomplete and/or late applications will not be considered.

Projects' activities can include, amongst others, the following:

  • Technical workshops, trainings.
  • Capacity building activities.
  • Institutional strengthening activities and advocacy

The following types of activity will not be covered:

  • Capital expenditure, e.g. land, buildings, equipment and vehicles.
  • Individual scholarships for studies or training courses.
  • Supporting political parties; and
  • Sub-contracting.

Due to the number of applications, only short-listed applicants will be notified.

Please note that the grant payment schedule will be determined with the selected grantee when finalizing the agreement. UNDRR standard practice is not to exceed 40% of the requested amount upon signature of the grant agreement; remaining payments made based on a schedule of payments linked to production of project milestones and the final payment, 20%, will be paid after the end of the project, once final documents have been received, verified and approved by UNDRR.

Refund of grants: UNDRR may request organizations to refund, either in part or in whole any amounts paid in respect of a grant when:

  • The project was not implemented in full or in part.
  • The grant was spent on ineligible expenditures other than those mentioned in the budget proposal submitted to and approved by UNDRR.
  • No narrative, financial or audit report was submitted within the deadline established by the grant agreement.
  • a narrative report and/or a financial report submitted was determined to be unsatisfactory.
  • a negative evaluation of the project by UNDRR.
  • any other valid reason provided by the UNDRR

[1] https://gain-new.crc.nd.edu/country/sudan

[2] Climate, Peace and Security Fact Sheet Sudan, 2022, SIPRI & NUPI.

[3] https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1PmJ9-TbS7GK1u50izMWZHqVQ8SH7yxG9/edit?slide=id.p1#slide=id.p1

[4]Flash flood, extreme heat, severe storms, drought, dry spells, sandstorms.

Explore further

Theme Early warning
Country and region Sudan