New Call for Proposals: Combatting Long-Term Unemployment through Social Innovation

The European Competence Centre for Social Innovation has just announced a new call ‘Innovative Approaches Tackling Long-Term Unemployment’. 

This Call aims to tackle long-term unemployment by implementing established and promising social innovations at a larger scale. With a grant budget of 23 million EUR, the focus of transnational projects will be on reintegrating individuals who have been unemployed for at least 12 months back into the labour market and enhancing their social inclusion. The transformative potential of social innovations can empower civil society, drive the development of new policy strategies, and ultimately reshape the social landscape. Projects funded through this initiative are expected to adopt individualised and inclusive approaches to support long-term unemployed individuals. Emphasis will be placed on fostering collaboration and partnerships among local employment stakeholders, employers, and communities.  

With indicative grant amounts ranging from €1 million to €3 million for each project of up to 36 months, it provides a substantial amount of funding to empower communities and build their capacity to act. One distinctive aspect of this Call is the encouragement to leverage previously successful local employment initiatives, particularly those documented in ESF+ Community of Practice on Employment, Education and Skills study ‘Towards Zero Long-term Unemployment in the EU: Job Guarantees and Other Innovative Approaches’. These initiatives recognise the work-related know-how and skills, as well as employability of all individuals and have demonstrated significant success in addressing long-term unemployment.  Overall high levels of satisfaction and low drop-out rates demonstrate the potential of these initiatives to successfully tackle long-term unemployment.  

Therefore, the activities under the funded projects should include strengthening collaboration between local communities and employers, providing diverse employment options for long-term unemployed individuals, and promoting social inclusion through tailored support services.  

Consortia applications are exclusively eligible for this Call, requiring the inclusion of an applicant (Coordinator) and at least one co-applicant representing different EU Member States, Iceland, Montenegro, Norway and Serbia. 

For those seeking potential transnational partners, the Social Innovation Match (SIM) database offers a platform to identify organisations whose work can inspire and contribute to collaborative efforts across the European Union.   

The Call opens on 18/04/2024 and closes at 5:00 PM CEST on 30/09/2024. 

Join us for the online session on May 28, 2024 followed by a match making session. 

For further details, please check the Call website.