Denton and Ocean Freight Reimbursement Programs Conference Call Minutes March 25, 2009 10-11:30 AM
Speakers:
Mauricio Vera, Acting Director of the Center for Faith-Based and Community Initiatives at USAID ( fbci@usaid.gov )
Dana Alzouma, Program Analyst, Commodity Logistics Team, Transportation Division, Office of Acquisition and Assistance at USAID ( dalzouma@usaid.gov )
Mauricio Vera
I'd like to welcome you all to our call today. I am Mauricio Vera and am currently the acting director for the Center for Faith-Based and Community Initiatives at USAID. We have an interesting program from you today, but before we get started I want to tell you all a bit about our office first. Part of our mandate is to provide assistance to small faith-based and community based organization and one or the major ways we outreach to this community is through these conference calls. I wanted to let you know that our office has had some contact with the new Executive Director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, Mr. Joshua DuBois. The White House Office is in the process of establishing regular contact with the various agency centers and we hope to have more information for you all in the future. In fact, we are pleased to announce that Mr. DuBois will be joining us for a call with you all in the near future. We'll let you know through our newsletter once the date and time are set.
Also, before we get started, I wanted to let you all know that today's call will cover the Denton Program and Ocean Freight Reimbursement Program. Unfortunately, Welford Walker with the Limited Excess Property Program is unable to join the call today. We will be highlighting this program in an upcoming call.
It gives me great pleasure to introduce our special guest today Dana Alzouma, the Program Analyst for both the Denton and Ocean Freight Reimbursement programs.
Dana Alzouma
Good morning everyone. I've been managing these programs for about 11 years now. I will try to do a brief overview of the programs. They are separate and have different requirements.
Denton Program
This program is jointly administered by USAID, the Department of State, and the Department of Defense. USAID processes the applications, inspects the goods, and looks at the humanitarian aspect and at the need within the recipient community. The Department of State addresses the policy aspect of the program and the Department of Defense issues the final transportation control number that allows the goods to get on their airplanes.
Goods are usually transported via airlift, however at times they are also transported via ships.
This program is open to non-governmental organizations (NGOs), private voluntary organizations (PVOs) and the general public. It is not required that you register with USAID as a PVO in order to participate in this program. You are eligible to participate in the program as long as you meet the guidelines and are not a government organization.
The program will transport to wherever there are established US military bases. Shipping locations do change however, and we suggest that you contact me to ensure that your location is one of the places that we ship to. Right now we primarily focus on Central America, South America, the Caribbean, Afghanistan, Iraq and the Philippines.
Please keep in mind that it always depends on the space available and the intended destination. We always encourage you to check with USAID prior to applying for this program to see if we are in fact transporting to your country of interest.
The goods that can be transported must be humanitarian aid items such as, canned or packaged food (ensuring that it can not be infested or damaged by the weather), appropriate clothes, medical supplies (there are extra guidelines when it comes to medical supplies), education supplies, agricultural goods, etc…
Applicants must be registered U.S. PVOs in order to apply. To learn more about registering as a PVO, click here.
The grant cycle takes place every two years and the next cycle begins in Fall 2009.
It's an application so you must respond to a Request For Application (RFA). In your application you should be prepared to project what you will be sending and the cost. This is a reimbursement program thus, if awarded a grant, you must complete your shipments before requesting reimbursement.
It is a limited costs reimbursement program, thus it will usually only reimburse port to port costs, only in the case of land locked countries will they reimburse some additional costs.
The OFR grant application process is very competitive. On average there will be anywhere from 75 to 100 applicants per RFA and usually there is only about $2 million available. Usually there are about 50 awards granted per cycle. All applicants are judged on the same criteria and are competing against each other.
The award amounts range anywhere from $5,000 to $150,000.
We find that a lot of newly registered PVOs start by partnering with USAID through this program. There's no preference given to larger organizations or organizations that have previously worked with USAID.
For more information, visit the OFR website by clicking here.
Q&A
1.Our organization just became a registered PVO with USAID. We focus in the Caribbean basin and partner with large freighters to ship goods within the region. Do we need to apply per country we ship to or would we apply for the region?
At this point there is no limit for the number of countries that you can apply for, however you would need to make a separate projection for each country. These projections must be submitted in one application.
2.We are a newer organization with a special focus on sending school supplies to Kenya and Uganda. Do these programs ship to either of those locations?
The Department of Defense has a program called the Funded Transportation Program that ships to Africa. Phyllis Marshall is the point of contact for the program and can be reached at Phyllis.marshall@dsca.mil or 703-601-3854.
3.Is there a website for the Department of Defense's Funded Transporation Program?
Yes, it is housed on the same website that the Denton Program is on (www.dentonfunded.ohasis.org). We do advise you however, to make sure that you click the correct link when on the page as it is a bit confusing at this point. There will be a new website coming out soon.
4.Does the Denton Program work in Haiti? If so, where would the goods be shipped to?
We used to transport there years ago, but due to security reasons we stopped. We have recently begun again. The Denton cargo is sent to the U.S. Military base there.
Close
Send any questions we did not have time to address to fbci@usaid.gov and we will provide answers.
The minutes from this call will be posted on the USAID CFBCI website and included in the weekly email newsletter.
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