Program for Investment in Microentrepreneurs Act

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The U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) has issued Funding Opportunity No. PRIME-2019-01 to provide training and capacity building grant programs to microenterprise development organizations (MDOs). The Program for Investment in Microentrepreneurs Act of 1999 (the PRIME Act) became law on November 12, 1999 with the passage of Pub. L. No. 106-102 (15 U.S.C. § 6901 note). The PRIME Act authorizes the SBA to provide funding to qualified organizations for the purposes of: (i) providing training and technical assistance to disadvantaged entrepreneurs; (ii) providing training and capacity building assistance to microenterprise development organizations (MDOs) and programs; (iii) aiding in Research and development of best practices for microenterprise and technical assistance programs for disadvantaged entrepreneurs; and (iv) for other activities as the SBA Administrator determines. In FY2019, PRIME has two tracks for which SBA will consider granting awards under this Funding Opportunity: Track 1 (Technical Assistance) – seeks applications for funding to provide training and technical assistance programs to disadvantaged entrepreneurs. Examples include training specifically designed to: (1) provides training and technical assistance to economically disadvantaged entrepreneurs in rural areas; and (2) training and technical assistance to support entrepreneurship in Hub Zones. Track 2 (Capacity Building) – seeks applications for funding to provide training and capacity building services to MDOs, microenterprise development programs, and groups of such organizations to assist them in developing microenterprise training and services. Examples include services geared towards building MDO capacity to provide business training and technical assistance to: (1) provides training and technical assistance to economically disadvantaged entrepreneurs in rural areas; and (2) training and technical assistance to support entrepreneurship in Hub Zones. View Section 3.0 of the Funding Opportunity for full eligibility criteria. Please note that for-profit organizations and individual persons are ineligible for this grant. SBA will evaluate applications for funding in accordance with the purposes of the Act, including an application’s ability to demonstrate mission -oriented and culturally competent projects and/or services that reflect local community demographics. Section 5.0 of the Funding Opportunity more fully defines the specific evaluation criteria. Questions about this Funding Opportunity should be directed to the Office of Economic Opportunity at prime@sba.gov .

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