48 percent of total funds of the SLP-II will be disbursed for the activities of Community Initiatives component.

Objective: To empower local citizens to strengthen their capacity to achieve sustainable livelihoods by establishing effective, inclusive and transparent community-driven mechanisms nationwide to facilitate community- based prioritization, selection, co-financing, and execution of communities’ highest priority investments in public facilities in rural areas.

Sub-components:

1. Community Initiatives Fund (CIF)

Objective: To provide funding for the identification, preparation and implementation of community investments

The project will expend considerable resources to ensure that the sub project identification selection process will provide them with an accurate representation of these priorities.

2. Community Empowerment and Capacity building

Objective:  To provide funding for capacity building and empowerment of communities under the CIF

• Support the transparent and inclusive implementation of the CI F through the information dissemination and advocacy by providing information to citizens on project implementation manual and procedures
• Training and Capacity building activities will be organized to citizens, local SLPC members and coordinators on project implementation, procurement, monitoring and evaluation procedures and best practices of project implementation
• The project will select a group of dynamic, motivated actives citizens from within the soum community, NGO and SSLPC/SGO members and train them as volunteer community mobilizers. Mobilizers will facilitate community in project implementation processes.

3. Innovation for Improved Social Services

Innovation grants will be awarded to agencies ( such as research institutes, NGOs and private citizens) to develop ideas that can approve the effectiveness of social services to poor and vulnerable citizens

Eligible Sub-projects

The sub-projects listed below provide an indication of the types of sub-projects in education, health; infrastructure and water that would be eligible based on past experience. However sub-projects should not be limited to these:

Education:  Including Soum/Duureg -level schools, informal training centres, bag/khoroo level schools, ger schools, pre-schools and kindergartens. Sub-projects will include:

• Rehabilitation of school classrooms/dormitories, in particular repair/replacement of heating systems and electrical systems, and canteen and bathing/washing/toilet facilities/gymnasium;
• Extension in number of classrooms/dormitory space, provided that, for any extension of faculties, availability of state budget for incremental running costs can be demonstrated;
• Provision of furniture, beds, renewable energy, books and teaching aids including computers for training of pupils in Soum/Duureg  level secondary schools;
• Provision and equipping of pre-schools and kindergartens including purchase of toys, games and pre primary educational materials;
• Provision of public housing for teachers;
• Energy sources for electricity provision to schools, dormitories and kindergartens;
• Rehabilitation of facilities for non-formal education to enable school dropouts to return to public schooling;
• Rehabilitation or improvement of other authorized public education facilities (open menu).

Health:  Including hospitals, clinics and feldsher bag/khoroo doctor practices. Sub projects will include:

• Rehabilitation/upgrading of hospitals and provision of laboratory and other medical equipment;
• Construction/upgrading and equipping of maternity homes;
• Improvement of communication systems between medical facilities;
• Provision of transport (motorcycles and horses) for feldshers;
• Energy sources for electricity provision to Soum/Duureg  hospitals;
• Provision of public housing for doctors;
• Provision or replacement of Soum/Duureg  ambulances;
• Rehabilitation or improvement of other public health facilities (open menu).

Roads and Bridges.  The emphasis for transport infrastructure will be on simple and generally labour intensive rehabilitation and repair of roads with the focus particularly on:

• Improvement to critical sections of roads (spot repairs);
• Drainage culverts;
• Embankment stabilization;
• River crossings (fords);
• Small concrete and timber bridges
• Rehabilitation & improvement of small rural transport infrastructure (open menu).

Other Public Physical Infrastructure The types of sub-projects include:

• Rehabilitation/repair of public bath houses and heating systems;
• Rehabilitation of environment and green zone, including flood protection structures and river diversion weirs;
• Soum/Duureg  public library rehabilitation and facilities improvement;
• Soum/Duureg  cultural centre rehabilitation and facilities improvement including audio/visual equipment or musical instruments;
• Soum/Duureg  television antenna rehabilitation;
• Soum/Duureg  central power station rehabilitation;
• Soum/Duureg  public market places;
• Soum/Duureg  public service centre rehabilitation;
• Provision of horse cart for Soum/Duureg  rubbish collection and transport;
• Soum/Duureg  gymnasium rehabilitation and facilities improvement;
• Equipment for public inspection of food quality in Soum/Duureg  marketplace;
• Watchtower for police to prevent crime in ger districts;
• Street lighting in peri-urban ger district; and
• Other public infrastructure (open menu).

Drinking Water The types of sub-projects include:

• Rehabilitation shallow wells and of deep groundwater wells;
• Spring protection;
• Rehabilitation or extension of piped water systems;
• Provision of equipment for drinking water cleaning or filtering; and
• Other public drinking water facilities improvement (open menu).

Ineligible Sub-projects

Sub-projects on the negative list and are ineligible for financing under the CIF are those that:

• Represent predominantly private/economic goods that would result in establishment or rehabilitation of private assets;
• Would benefit few households;
• Could have a negative environmental impact or negative social consequences;
• Would result in the rehabilitation or construction of religious facilities;
• Would involve purchase of weapons or ammunition;
• Would have no direct benefits to ordinary citizens, such as rehabilitation of the bag/khoroo  governor office or the Soum/Duureg  government office
• Would only do routine maintenance or pay recurrent costs and have no lasting public benefit such as repainting or decorating school classrooms
• Would involve employing labourers for a short time to do an activity that has no lasting employment effects or public benefits (such as mobilizing a group of unemployed people for cleaning garbage or picking up dry wood from the forest)
• Would be financed by another project or receive financing from another source.