About the U.S. Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation Program (AFCP)

Created by the United States Congress and administered by the Center for Cultural Heritage in the Office for Educational and Cultural Affairs of the State Department, AFCP supports the conservation of traditional cultural sites, objects and forms of expression in more than 120 countries. Projects financed by this fund include the restoration of old and historical buildings, evaluation and conservation of manuscripts and museum collections, preservation and protection of important archaeological sites and documentation of indigenous languages ​​and traditional artisan techniques in danger of extinction. Since 2001, it has supported more than 550 cultural preservation projects in more than 100 countries.

In the Dominican Republic, in previous years the selected projects include: the inventory of the permanent collection of the Museum of the Dominican Man, the digitization of photographs and films of the Dominican Resistance Museum, the restoration of the Altar of the Sacred Relic in the Cathedral of Santo Domingo, the restoration and conservation of the textile collection of the Mirabal Sisters House Museum, the rescue and restoration of the 20th century mural, “Haitian Massacre, 1937” by Dominican artists José Ramírez Conde and Roberto Flores and the preservation and digitization of the Sosua Jewish Museum collection.

The Cultural Heritage Center contributes to the foreign relations functions of the US Department of State relating to the protection and conservation of cultural heritage. It serves as a knowledge center on issues related to the protection of world cultural heritage and is responsible for U.S. obligations around the 1970 UNESCO Convention on Measures to Prohibit and Prevent Import, Export and Transfer of Unlawful Property of Cultural Property.

The Cultural Heritage Center for fiscal year 2023 is combining the small and large grant programs into a single program. Pending availability of funds, awards will range from $10,000 to $500,000.

The Cultural Heritage Center is dividing the application process into two rounds and reducing the amount of information required up front. The first streamlined round will collect project ideas from embassies in the form of concept notes, due November 21, 2022. In Round 2, the Center will invite embassies with promising ideas to submit full project applications, due February, 2023.

Call for proposals AFCP 2023

AFCP– 2023

The U.S. Embassy Santo Domingo on behalf of the Cultural Heritage Center in the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) is accepting concept notes for the 2023 Grants Competition of the U.S. Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation (AFCP).

The deadline for submitting concept notes to the U.S. Embassy is November 21, 2022.