Priority areas for the allocation of EMS funds have been evolving according to the permanent analysis of the demand for knowledge for decision making, as expressed by the regional municipal governments when faced with urban environmental management.

The call for the allocation of such support funds for research in the field of urban environmental management is done through regional distribution nodes, with the assistance of institutions associated to EMS and through the distribution list of the INFO-EMS bulletin.

The EMS has developed a competitive research fund management programme that has been evaluated as highly efficient. Despite this fact, the programme is undergoing a process of exchange of information on its procedures with other similar programmes to ensure its permanent improvement.

The strengths of the procedure used by the EMS lie mainly on its instruments for:

• Helping improve the design of proposals and the linking processes between municipalities and research centres.
• Promoting an evaluation system for the submitted proposals and approved projects, done by experts related to the specific field.
• Making good use of visits from experts of associated institutions who are in charge of monitoring projects, to advise on potential difficulties in the evaluation of project implementation during implementation.
• Providing guarantees to financial management procedures of funds, vis-à-vis the support of CIID/IDRC administrative resources.
• Evaluating project outputs and ensuring their correct dissemination.

Note: this calls are closed. 
In this section you will find the final reports of the projects ("case studies") financed by the EMS, in the framework  of various calls:

URBAN SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT

There were two calls, one in 1996 and the other in 1998.
As a result, there were 12 case studies selected. See the list at: http://www.ems-sema.org/english/proyectos/solidaria/residuos.html 

MANAGEMENT OF MICRO BASINS AND URBAN POLLUTION

This call were launched together with the Waste Management one, in two phases (1996 y 1998).
See the list of the 15 case studies selected at:
http://www.ems-sema.org/english/proyectos/solidaria/cuencas.html  

RESEARCH PROGRAM ON PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS FOR THE URBAN ENVIRONMENT
(organized and launched together with the Urban Management Programme, Regional Office for Latin America and the Caribbean - United Nations Center for Human Settlements (UNCHS/HABITAT and Public-Private Partnerships for the Urban Environment (PPPUE) Programme)

This call for research projects aimed to facilitate the study of these partnership mechanisms and to organise and disseminate a source of information on design modalities and ongoing experiences at the regional level. The studies supported aimed at the analysis of institutional policies and mechanisms developed by municipal governments and the private sector partners, facilitating the role of third actors throughout these processes and the participation –in the total or partial delivery of environmental management services—of community groups and small enterprises.

It were divided into two issues, orientated to the public-private partnership at a municipal level.  There were selected 8 case studies.

MUNICIPAL POLICIES FOR PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS
5 case studies - Municipalities of: Brasil, Bolivia, Chile, El Salvador and Perú.

PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS EVALUATION AT MUNICIPAL LEVEL
3 case studies - Municipalities of: Argentina, Perú and Uruguay.

More information about this call, including the theoretical framework, results of case studies, and a reference database (with reference to documents, projects, experts, events) is available at:
 http://www.ems-sema.org/castellano/proyectos/solidaria/ppp/eng_index.html 

OTHER CALLS