U.S. Embassy Funding Opportunities

The U.S. Embassy in Addis Ababa offers critical financial support to projects initiated by Ethiopian NGOs, community- and faith-based groups, and civic associations that promote the well-being of the Ethiopian people.

The two avenues for providing this grassroots assistance are the Ambassador’s Special Self-Help Program and the Democracy and Human Rights Fund. Distinct from larger-scale assistance carried out by other parts of the United States Government, these funds support small-scale, short-term activities designed to bring about tangible improvements in people’s lives.

In the past three years, the Ambassador’s Special Self-Help Program (SSHP) and the Democracy and Human Rights Fund (DHRF) have together granted 623,875 USD to 69 projects that benefited 966,678 people in all regions of Ethiopia. The impact has been tremendous.

Projects supported by the SSHP and DHRF have built schools where none previously existed; provided clean, accessible water so women and children spend fewer hours fetching water; provided vocational training and equipment so poor girls can stop living on the streets; built housing so homeless veterans and their families no longer have to live in a trash dump; protected little girls from Female Genital Mutilation; provided disabled persons with manually-operated wheelchairs and elbow crutches; reduced conflict between opposing ethnic groups; and built bridges so swollen rivers don’t prevent people from getting needed medical care or selling their wares on market day. 

If your project promises to improve people’s lives in the ways described above, we invite you to apply for funding.

“I believe firmly that people-to-people projects such as these exemplify the best of U.S. humanitarian assistance. They touch people at the community or village level and provide them the support needed to improve their lives and the lives of their children.”

-- Ambassador Huddleston at the Small Projects Signing Ceremony on October 20, 2005