AU-EU Youth Action Lab grants deadline: September 23, 2026
by Piyush Mathur
The AU-EU Youth Action Lab has put out a call for an unspecified number of 12-month-long innovation and entrepreneurial grants for non-profit, non-governmental organisations. An eligible organisation will be led by a person (or persons) below the age of 35, and with an executive staff whose members will also be persons below the age of 35; it will also be registered in one (or more) of the following 12 countries: Ethiopia, Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia (Somaliland Region), Tanzania, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia or Zimbabwe.
The Lab itself is also located and registered in each of the above countries.
The current grant period will run through January-December 2027, and the deadline to make an (organisational) application is September 23, 2026 at 13.00 PM Central African Time (CAT). One organisation can apply for only one grant in a given cycle—and the organisation’s overall agenda should be centred around, or reflect the priorities of, people below the age of 35; individuals cannot apply for this grant.
As for a proposed project, it will have to be worth € 42,000, not above or below; it will also have to run for 12 months, and approach a given social or entrepreneurial challenge intersectionally. As to what an intersectional approach means, it is explained in the Question and Answer section of the Lab’s webpage.
The Lab has put out a lot of sprawling information on its website about the eligibility requirements and the grant process; unfortunately, many critical facts are not mentioned or clarified in the main description itself. For instance, the main description uses the term ‘young people’ without referencing an age bracket; likewise, it is not really made clear there whether individuals can directly apply for the grant, even though the pronoun ‘you’ is used (when ‘your organisation’ would have been more appropriate). Even the grant amount is mentioned separately as a response to a question (and there are far too many of them) in the Q&A section of the website.
Thoughtfox has made an attempt above to dig through the several layered links on the website to pull out the critical facts and state them clearly. The Lab is strongly advised to cut through its clutter in the future, and not attempt to mollycoddle adults—apparently driven by the assumption that they are ‘young people’—by over-explaining stuff that should have been compressed into a single-page description.
Notably, the Lab will also hold a webinar on September 03, 2026, at 13.00 PM CAT to discuss its application process with interested organisations. This is the link for the webinar:
https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_xe-lJcsCRaqk0jZGU0ZTAA#/registration
One good thing about the Lab’s grant application process is that its website includes a Compulsory Budget Template, which would greatly help the applicants as well as the selectors.