Message for implementers and accountants of ICP 

Explanation Grant Obligations and Conditions OKP-icp 3.0

We received quite a lot of questions about the required actions and reports to be supplied by the accountants following the Grant Obligations & Conditions (GOC) OKP-icp 3.0.

As a result we would like to clarify towards you as Grant recipients and accountants what is meant and what needs  to be done by recipients and accountant regarding the financial reports. Please note that the GOC has not been changed; this letter is solely intended to bring clarification in the requirements. 

Attached you will find a schematic overview which explains the items that were unclear, for example when an audit is required and in which situation. Also attached is an overview of examples.

• What to do in what case
• Example cases

A few points of attention:

• If costs in category A (time of an NL/EU partner) are above € 100.000, an audit is compulsory. This applies to all NL/EU partners. If those costs are under € 100.000, an audit is only compulsory for the grant recipient if the grant amount is above € 200.000, not for partners of the grant recipient. 
• There is no audit compulsory if the grant is below € 200.000 and the category A (time of an NL/EU partner) are under € 100.000.
• Regional partners send their reports to the EU partner. An audited report is strictly not compulsory, but as the GOC is open to multiple interpretations, Nuffic decided that locally made audit costs can be reimbursed if they have been budgeted by the organization beforehand.
• The accountant of the grant recipient can only include the audit of the partner in their audit opinion if they also are the accountant of that partner. This means that if they are not, the accountant of the grant recipient should include the audit opinion of the partner in his report of findings. 

In case there are still questions left, we have planned a Q&A meeting on the 27th June 16.00 to answer them. Please contact your usual Nuffic contact person for more information.

Adjusted COCA forms 

In order to comply with European subsidy legislation, we recently made some adjustments to our Checklists for Organisational Capacity Assessment, better known as the COCA forms.

The adjustments that were made, were all related to the so-called exclusion criteria. The exclusion criteria refer to 12 criteria that are considered important checks in the process of assessing project applications. Both the Orange Knowledge Programme (ICP and group training) and the MENA Scholarship programme (group training) now have renewed COCA forms.

The following are the extra criteria that were added to the COCA forms:

• Breach of obligations relating to the payment of taxes or social security contributions
• Conduct related to a criminal organisation
• Money laundering or terrorist financing
• Terrorist offences or offences linked to terrorist activities
• Child labour and other trafficking in human beings
• Irregularities
• Creating or being a shell company

Most of these criteria are mentioned under 3.1.4. of the different COCA forms.

The new COCA forms are already online.

We hereby ask you to kindly use the latest version if you request a new COCA or a renewal of your COCA:

• Institutional Collaboration Projects (OKP) 
• Group Training (OKP)
• Group Training (MSP)

Results Individual scholarships & TMT 2021

Individual Scholarships

We recently allocated 475 OKP Short Course scholarships as a result of the applications of round 1 of 2022. The gender distribution is 51% female and 49% male. We are glad to see a thematic distribution with 25% for courses related to SRHR and 24% for courses related to SRoL. Furthermore, we have also received 1,829 applications for the last round of OKP Master scholarships, out of which we selected 286 candidates for a scholarship. For the Masters scholarships we are also satisfied with both gender distribution (49% female, 51% male) and themes (SRHR 26%, and SRoL 19%).

TMT Q4 2021
The results of the last TMT call which opened in October 2021 are now published on our website. Are you wondering which 27 initiatives were granted? Please check the online overview.