FCI4Africa Open Call 1 (OC1) | Up to €50,000 for Research & Technology Stakeholders Advancing Fair Food and Trade Systems in Africa

FCI4Africa — Fair food and trade systems for Africa through food convergence innovation is a Horizon Europe-funded project responding to the growing demand for sustainable, fair, and just food trade between Africa and Europe. Funded by the European Commission under Grant Agreement Number 101182485, the project bridges two major transformations: the tightening of EU market entry requirements under the Green Deal, Farm-to-Fork Strategy, and Deforestation-Free Regulation, and the expansion of intra-African trade under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), which is creating a single market of 1.3 billion people.

FCI4Africa develops and tests digital tools, analytical methods, and participatory business models that verify product provenance, food safety, and social fairness; assess the impacts of non-tariff measures (NTMs); and strengthen self-regulation and certification systems. By linking farmers, SMEs, regulators, and certification bodies through data-driven systems, it supports a new generation of African agri-food products that are competitive, verifiable, and trusted in both domestic and international markets.

About Open Call 1 (OC1)

FCI4Africa has launched its first Open Call (OC1) addressed to research and technology stakeholders — including start-ups, SMEs, research organisations, and other multidisciplinary actors to test, validate, and enhance business concepts and tools that advance climate-neutral, socially just, and fair trade food systems within Africa.

OC1 is funded by the European Union and managed by reframe.food (RFF) as Open Call Manager and Treasurer, with the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) as project coordinator.

Funding Details

• Maximum Grant per Sub-project: €50,000
• Total OC1 Budget: €400,000
• Maximum Number of Sub-projects Funded: 8
• Funding Mechanism: Lump sum payments per implementation phase no pre-financing
• Single Applicants Only: Consortia are NOT permitted. One entity per proposal.
• Each entity may submit only one proposal. If found in multiple applications, all will be rejected.

Payment Schedule (linked to deliverables):

Phase 1 — Design (November 2026 – January 2027, 3 months): 20% of total grant upon delivery of an Activity Plan.

Phase 2 — Development (February 2027 – July 2027, 6 months): 50% of total grant upon delivery of a Results Demonstration.

Phase 3 — Validation (August 2027 – October 2027, 3 months): Final 30% of total grant upon delivery of a Report on Dissemination Activities and Lessons Learnt.

Key Dates

• OC1 Launch: 7 April 2026
• Application Deadline: 30 June 2026 at 17:00 CEST
• Deadline for Clarification Questions: 26 June 2026 at 17:00 CEST
• Technical Support Deadline: 24 June 2026 at 17:00 CEST
• Eligibility Check: July 2026
• Evaluation & Sub-grant Preparation: July – October 2026
• Contract Negotiations: 1 September – 31 October 2026
• Selected Projects Launch: November 2026
• Implementation End: October 2027

What the Call Funds — Two Objectives

Objective 1: Test, validate, and enhance the existing business concepts and tools of the FCI4Africa project, including those already developed within the project's Use Cases.

Objective 2: Develop ideas and tools that address specific challenges of FCI4Africa.

All funded projects must generate datasets that contribute to the refinement of FCI4Africa tools, methodologies, and business concepts. Solutions do not need to be tied to existing FCI4Africa Use Cases, but must align with the broader project objectives and address at least one of the following challenges:

• Lack of sustainability, fairness, and justness in the agri-food sector
• Difficulties in complying with new EU legislation and trade policies
• High certification costs creating barriers for African small-scale farmers
• Fragmentation of intra-African agricultural trade
• Limited transparency and data obstructing the integration of the informal sector
• Inconsistency of non-tariff measures across regions

TRL Requirement: Solutions must start at TRL 3–4 and reach TRL 6 by the end of the project.

FCI4Africa's Three Use Cases (for reference)

Proposals may align with but are not restricted to the following active use cases:

Use Case 1 — Promoting a healthy, safe, and profitable food system through scaling proven food safety technologies (Burkina Faso, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria). Focused on aflatoxin contamination reduction, food safety traceability, and fair flow of safe produce to domestic markets.

Use Case 2 — Deploying digital solutions for trade facilitation through compliance with integrated quality standards and NTMs (Kenya, Nigeria). Focused on micronutrient fortification indices, digital trade compliance tools, and self-regulation systems for food processors.

Use Case 3 — Elaborate approaches to increase resilience of rural communities against shocks (Senegal, Nigeria). Focused on building resilience of vulnerable rural households, particularly women-headed households, against climate, economic, and sociodemographic shocks.

Who Can Apply

Eligible Applicant Types:

• Universities and research institutes
• Technology developers and R&D SMEs
• Innovation-driven start-ups (established within the past 10 years, focused on scalable innovation)
• Other multidisciplinary research and technology stakeholders

Important — For Universities and Research Institutions: The single-entity rule applies at department level. Different departments of the same institution may each submit a separate proposal, but no single department may submit more than one application.

SME Definition: To qualify as an SME, applicants must comply with EC Recommendation 2003/361/EC fewer than 250 employees (Annual Work Units) and annual turnover not exceeding €50 million. An EC online SME self-assessment tool is available if applicants are uncertain.

Key Restrictions — the following are NOT eligible:

• Consortia of any kind, one entity per proposal only
• Existing FCI4Africa consortium members and their affiliated entities
• Applicants with a confirmed, paid relationship with any FCI4Africa consortium partner
• Applicants pre-selected in other open calls under the same Horizon Europe topic (HORIZON-CL6-2024-FARM2FORK-01-11), such as STREAMING
• Legal entities established in Russia, Belarus, or non-government-controlled territories of Ukraine
• Hungarian public interest trusts established under Act IX of 2021 (ineligible for FSTP funding)
• Entities subject to EU restrictive measures

Geographic eligibility: Applicants must be legal entities established in countries eligible for Horizon Europe funding. This includes all EU Member States, Horizon Europe-associated countries (including Albania, Armenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Canada, Faroe Islands, Georgia, Iceland, Israel, Kosovo, Moldova, Montenegro, New Zealand, North Macedonia, Norway, Serbia, Switzerland, Tunisia, Türkiye, Ukraine, and the United Kingdom), and a wide range of low- to middle-income countries that are automatically eligible for funding. African countries on this list include Algeria, Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cabo Verde, Cameroon, Chad, Comoros, Congo (DRC), Congo (Republic), Côte d'Ivoire, Djibouti, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, São Tomé and Príncipe, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Africa, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and others. Applicants are advised to consult the EU Funding & Tenders Portal for the most up-to-date country eligibility list.

Sub-project activities must be implemented within Africa and directly target local food system actors and value chains.

Eligible Costs

All funding is provided on a lump sum basis. Cost categories that are eligible include:

Personnel costs — staff delivering the work and preparing deliverables across the three phases, calculated according to national regulations and real labour market data. Personnel costs are direct costs and cannot be counted as indirect costs.

Subcontracting — permitted up to a maximum of 25% of the proposed budget when clearly justified. Coordination tasks cannot be subcontracted. Any subcontracted organisation must not be part of the FCI4Africa consortium.

Purchase costs — including travel costs necessary for project execution; depreciation costs for purchased equipment (borrowing or lending equipment is not eligible); and other goods and services such as consumables, dissemination, open access publishing, translations, and publications.

Indirect costs — overheads of up to 25% of total direct costs (subcontracting excluded from this calculation).

Dissemination budget requirement: A minimum of 7% of the total funding must be allocated to dissemination activities, including information days, field days, workshops, and informal events promoting FCI4Africa results.

Record-keeping: Sub-grantees must keep all original documents for at least 3 years after final payment (for grants up to €60,000) or 5 years for larger grants, and must make these available to the EC upon request during any audit.

Evaluation Process

All eligible proposals will be reviewed by two external evaluators with expertise in agri-food, agriculture, food safety, climate change, biodiversity, and sustainability. Proposals are scored across four equally weighted award criteria, each scored from 1 to 5 with a minimum threshold of 3 per criterion and a minimum total score of 12.

Criterion 1 — Concept and Feasibility (threshold: 3/5): Clarity and practicality of the concept, alignment with FCI4Africa's Use Cases or objectives, work plan coherence, soundness of the proposed solution, ethics and compliance, and gender and inclusivity.

Criterion 2 — Technology Readiness and Innovation Development (threshold: 3/5): Technical feasibility, approach and methodology, and TRL readiness (starting at TRL 3–4 and reaching TRL 6).

Criterion 3 — Impact and Exploitation (threshold: 3/5): Demonstrated impact on the FCI4Africa ecosystem, dissemination and policy uptake strategies, and long-term value and scalability for African food systems.

Criterion 4 — Organisational Capacity and Sufficiency (threshold: 3/5): Team expertise, gender balance and diversity, budget realism and allocation, use of resources, and risk management.

From the pool of eligible proposals, the top 8 highest-scoring proposals will be funded, provided each addresses a different FCI4Africa solution to avoid overlaps. Tie-breaking follows the order: Concept and Feasibility → Impact and Exploitation → Technology Readiness → Organisational Capacity. In the event of an absolute tie, the Open Call Advisory Board makes the final decision.

All applicants receive an Evaluation Summary Report (ESR). Redress requests for eligibility decisions must be submitted within 3 working days; for evaluation results within 5 working days.

How to Apply

Applications must be submitted exclusively through the opencalls.fund platform developed by reframe.food. Submissions via any other channel will not be considered and will be automatically discarded.

Registration on opencalls.fund is required before submission. Only registered users can apply and submit questions to the FAQ section.

All documents must be submitted in PDF format only (maximum 10MB per file; .zip files not accepted). The proposal must use the official Proposal Template (Annex 5), must not exceed 15 pages (excluding cover page, Table of Contents, and Budget Tables), and must use Arial font at minimum 11pt with minimum 15mm margins.

All applications, deliverables, reports, and communications must be submitted in English. Official legal documents may be submitted in their original language, but translations may be requested.

Applications must be submitted before 30 June 2026 at 17:00 CEST. Late submissions will not be accepted under any circumstances, including technical difficulties.

For questions and support: fci4africa@opencalls.fund 

For more information: https://fci4africa.eu/open-calls/open-call-1/

Sub-grantee Responsibilities

Selected sub-grantees are indirect beneficiaries of European Commission funding and carry obligations including: compliance with the Do No Significant Harm (DNSH) principle across all six EU Taxonomy environmental objectives; full disclosure and avoidance of conflicts of interest; ethics by design throughout project implementation; visibility requirements including display of the EU flag and FCI4Africa logo in all communications; retention of IPR over results generated (with some results to be shared for FCI4Africa dissemination purposes); and cooperation with any EC financial audits for up to 5 years after project completion.