The Facility « Investing for Employment » is offering grants per project range between 1 million EUR and 10 million EUR to companies, non-profit organisations and public partners to overcome obstacles to investments.

The Facility contributes co-financing grants for employment-enhancing investments, accompanying advisory services and the setup of investments, such as environmental and social impact assessments. This will remove barriers to creating additional and better jobs in the private sector.

The grants are made available by means of competitive calls for proposals on the basis of transparent funding criteria. The selection of projects is based on a competitive application process. The Facility looks for an optimal allocation of available funding to projects with the highest plausibility of success and expected return in terms of the number and quality of new jobs created. The Facility provides co-financing grants for new investment projects with a high job creation impact.

The Facility « Investing for Employment » (Facility) is a regional investment facility, created by KfW Development Bank (KfW) on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and is an integral part of the Special Initiative on Training and Job Creation.

Funding Information

The facility IFE provides grants between €1 million and €10 million to co-finance four types of projects:

• Public Infrastructure for job creation – not-for-profit (up to 90% of the cost).
• Common service for job creation – not-for-profit (up to 75% of the cost).
•  For-profit-projects that foster direct job creation which have benefits/impacts more broadly than solely for the project owners (up to 50% of the cost).
•  For-profit-projects that foster direct job creation by the project owners (up to 25% of the cost).

Eligible Projects

In order to qualify for a grant of the Facility, a project must lead to the creation of decent direct or indirect jobs. It is important to conservatively estimate and justify how many direct and indirect jobs will be generated by the project:

Direct jobs

• Are created as the straight result of the applicant’s proposed project, and
• Are created directly within the entity of the applicant. Here the applicant (or his SPV4) Signs employment contracts with the new employees.

Note - Direct jobs apply especially to projects of category 3 and 4.

Indirect jobs

• Are also created as the straight result of the applicant’s proposed project, but they
• Are created at one or more entities, that are legally separate and organizationally
•  Independent from the applicant
• And evidence must be provided to justify the link between the proposed project and the expected  indirect  job creation.

Note - Indirect jobs apply especially to projects of category 1, 2 and 3.

Regardless of whether direct or indirect, a new job is only accepted by the Facility, if the employee:

•  receives at least the guaranteed interprofessional minimum wage (SMIG) in accordance with the labour legislation applied in Morocco.
• works and is paid for at least 20 hours per week over a period of at least 26 weeks per year (or any combination of at least 520 hours of employment).

Project Categories

Determined by the type of project, and which form of entity is leading the project – the proposed project falls within one of the Facility’s four categories – if eligible for funding:

• Public infrastructure for job creation.
• Common servicefor job creation.
•  For-profit projects with broader job creation impact.
•  For-profit projects for job creation

Eligible Criteria

• Individual applicants (legal entities registered in Morocco).
• Consortia (two or more legal entities,  with  at least one registered in Morocco).

For more information, visit Investing for Employment.