How much you can apply for depends on a number of factors including: how much you need to raise; the scale of your project; and, how much your organisation has raised already.  Whether you are applying for revenue / unrestricted core costs, project / specific activities or capital costs, the Foundation tends not to support more than 10% of the total budget. The Trustees expect an organisation to have secured around half the funding required before applying to us.  Please note we are unlikely to fund charities where their annual spend, or budget/project is less than N$50,000.

We encourage organisations to develop a sustainable funding base so that they are not overly reliant on one funder.  Our Trustees therefore will consider a grant towards your costs but are unlikely to fund the total costs of a project or a large proportion of your total expenditure.

Our Trustees are experienced grant-makers and will use their judgement as to what amount of funding they feel is appropriate and are able to grant to a charity.  You therefore do not have to specify an amount in your application unless you wish to do so – simply outline the cost of your work/project, what funds are secured so far and what the current shortfall is.

The types of grant we make, whatever their size, tend to fall into one of three categories – Capital (i.e. buildings and equipment), Revenue / unrestricted core costs and Project / specific activity costs.  The most important thing is that you apply for what you need most as this will be your priority and therefore the most compelling for our Trustees.

Applications for Regular Grants (under N$50,000) are reviewed by our Trustees on a regular basis and are dealt with in order of receipt. There are no deadlines that applicants need to worry about meeting. Applicants for a Major Grant (N$50,000 and over) will be advised which Board meeting they are to apply to if invited to do so following their initial letter and subsequent phone call with either our Director or one of our Grants Managers.

If you apply online you will receive an immediate email acknowledgement letting you know that we have received your application. You should then allow up to four months for a final outcome – this is due to the volume of applications we receive and because we take great care in reviewing each one individually.

The Foundation reviews applications in order of receipt in order to be fair – you should allow up to four months from the date of your acknowledgement letter / email as we receive thousands of requests every year. In exceptional circumstances it is possible for our Trustees to review an application more quickly, however it is important that there is a legitimate reason why this might be the case – we aim to be fair and are therefore not able to ‘queue-jump’ everyone!