Open Call for Expressions of Interest for Ukraine

The New Democracy Fund Strategic Grants 2025–2026

The New Democracy Fund offers Ukrainian CSOs to submit an Expression of Interest for the New Democracy Fund’s Strategic Grant Cycle 2025–2026, focused on justice, accountability, transparency, and anti-corruption.

We invite influential Ukrainian CSOs that hold established roles in national level working groups and maintain strong networks and policy influence. We encourage young, and regional, local CSOs to participate as co-applicants in partnership with these influential implementing organizations, creating consortiums and collaboration mechanisms able to bring political change and ensure broad coverage across the country in achieving the project’s goals.

Deadline for Strategic Grant Cycle – Expression of Interest for Ukraine (SGCU): 10 December 2025 at 23:59 CET

Why we’ve launched this call

Civil society actors across the Eastern Neighbourhood Countries (ENC) are operating in increasingly complex and uncertain environments, facing both political pressures and reduced access to sustainable funding. The result is a growing risk of democratic backsliding, weakened oversight of public institutions, and shrinking space for civic participation. In Ukraine, these challenges are amplified by the full-scale war, martial law, and the urgent need to ensure transparency and accountability in recovery and reconstruction processes, as well as Ukraine’s pursue for EU membership.

In response, the New Democracy Fund (NDF) is launching the Strategic Grant Cycle 2025-2026 to reinforce the foundations of democratic resilience in the region. For Ukraine, this includes strengthening the role of civil society in safeguarding democratic institutions during wartime, preventing corruption risks in reconstruction and recovery of Ukraine, advancing economic transparency by encouraging the transition from the shadow economy and informalized labour. Greater economic transparency and formalization of employment are essential not only for protecting workers’ rights and ensuring fair and safe working conditions, but also for increasing public revenues that would be reinvested into Ukraine’s recovery. At the same time, it remains crucial to ensure that communities and war-affected groups have a meaningful voice in decision-making.

The 2025–2026 Strategic Grant Cycle for Ukrainian civil society will prioritize initiatives advancing justice, accountability, transparency, and anti-corruption. This includes civic oversight of public institutions, strengthening integrity systems and economic transparency, evidence-based advocacy for public administration and sectoral reforms, monitoring recovery spending, and protecting human rights in line with European values and integration commitments.

What We Will Support

Projects that aim to:

Strengthen democratic institutions, human rights, and the rule of law at national and regional levels.
Promote pluralism, civic participation, and inclusive governance in line with the Copenhagen Criteria.
Build institutional resilience through improved governance, transparency in economy and formalization of labour. financial sustainability, and digital security.
Contribute analytical insights into EU integration processes and their implications for local communities, aiming improving local anti-corruption measures, and increasing transparency in recovery and reconstruction.

Who Can Apply

Eligible actors include independent CSOs, analytical institutions/think tanks, coalitions and networks, media actors and media-related NGOs, as well as business associations, trade unions, employers’ organisations, and labour-rights NGOs engaged in democratic governance, human rights and rule-of-law efforts.

Priority will be given to registered Ukrainian NGOs that:

Demonstrate strong experience in justice, accountability, transparency, and anti-corruption, as well as a track record of sustained democratic impact and strategic relevance.
Offer an innovative approach, introducing new methods, smart solutions to achieve the project’s objectives rather than merely extending existing activities.
Operate independently and consistently uphold human rights and democratic values.
Have the potential to serve as regional reference points or multipliers, contributing to wider democratic resilience.
Can operate effectively at the national level while also establishing or coordinating networks at regional and local levels to ensure effective project implementation, including through an umbrella approach that engages a wider network within civil society.
Demonstrate readiness for capacity sharing and peer learning, contributing to sector-wide strengthening.
Have an annual turnover above €220.000, proven financial and administrative reliability, demonstrated through annual reports and/or financial audits.

Available Funding

Total envelope: approximately DKK 4 875 000 (EUR 650 000).
Expected portfolio: 4-5 grants.
Grant size: determined by organisational capacity, strategic relevance, and proposed activities.
Funds will be disbursed in phases tied to agreed milestones; all activities must be completed by December 1, 2026.
Grantees receiving more than DKK 100,000 (≈ EUR 13,000) will undertake a capacity assessment leading to a tailored development plan embedded in the grant agreement.

Selection Process and Timeline

Submission of Expression of Interest – 10 December 2025, at 23:59 CET
Evaluation of Expression of Interest: notification of successful candidates and invitation to submit longform application submission – 21 December 2025
Deadline for longform application submission – 10 January 2026
Final decision notification – 1 February 2026

How to Apply

Please follow the LINK to complete the application for Strategic Grant Cycle – Expression of Interest for Ukraine (SGCU) – and submit it by 10 December 2025 at 23:59 CET. If you don’t have a profile, create one to access our application portfolio via the link.

If you have questions regarding this call, you can contact us on:
olma@mediasupport.org

If you experience any technical challenges, please contact:

support@grant.nu

Best regards,

The New Democracy Fund