The European Union will be supporting Jordanian NGOs to advance civil society through media by means of grants to local media organizations.  Over the next two years, a total of 250,000 euros will be available for Jordanian not for profit organizations in the form of 8-10 grants contracted and supervised by the Amman-based Community Media Network (CMN). The first round of applications was announced today. Funds are expected to be disbursed to winning applications by the end of the year. Grants will be of the amount between 25,000- 30,000 euros each.

Daoud Kuttab, Director General of CMN, says that the grants will promote   human rights and especially women-led media projects that aim at using media to support women and human rights. “We are looking forward to receiving project applications s that can help advance human rights by way of media.

Kuttab said that an independent committee composed of national and international media and human rights experts will be responsible for the selection of the applicants.

Andrea Fontana, the EU Ambassador in Jordan says that “The EU in Jordan is very pleased to be able to reach out to women-led media especially outside Amman and we hope that this sub-granting scheme will strengthen the female voice in the Jordanian society and its media landscape ".

Etaf Roudan, Manager of the EU-funded Sawteq Haweeteq project says that the aim is to give voice to the voiceless. “We want civil society groups and especially women-led organizations to take advantage of this call by conceiving projects that can empower them and help them articulate and spread the values that they believe in by using different media platforms.”

To qualify - registered not for profit Jordanian organizations must apply by 1st of November.

Information sessions will take place in three locations in the Kingdom to help answer questions from interested NGOS. Specific details on the information session will be disseminated in the press in the coming days.

The grant application can be accessed online

The grant calls come as part of a multi-year grant to CMN by the European Union entitled “EU support for Empowering Civil Society through Media.” The project is carried out in association with Sisterhood is Global Institute-Jordan, Information and research Center at the King Hussein Foundation, Community Media Solutions and the Association of Community Radio (AMARC).

Community Media Network is a not for profit media NGO established in 2007 with the aim of using community media to advance social values. CMN administers Radio al Balad and AmmanNet news website as well as the Hona Zarqa media project  run by trained female journalists from Zarqa.