Federal grant programs / Department of the Interior

Western Hemisphere Regional (15.640)

• Awarded, FY 2021 to 2025$10.3 million
• Grant awards59
• Typical award$191,060
• Awarded in FY 2025$804,202
• Size rank1,483 of 1,823
• Type of assistanceProject grants (discretionary)

Key findings

• Annual funding fell from $5.1 million in fiscal 2021 to $804,202 in fiscal 2025.
• It is the 1483rd largest of 1,823 federal grant programs by five-year awards.
• The 20 largest recipients received 78% of the money.
• Awards went to recipients in 10 states and territories.

What the program funds

The mission of the Latin America Regional Program is to provide technical and financial assistance to partners to conserve the region’s priority species and their habitats. It advances its mission by supporting projects that reduce threats to key wildlife species and strengthen local capacity that results in measurable conservation impacts that benefit biodiversity and its people in the long-term. The program targets projects that clearly articulate how the proposed actions will reduce the threats of unsustainable resource use, habitat loss and fragmentation, agricultural expansion, and/or human-wildlife conflict under at least one of the following categories: Species Conservation: This category seeks to support projects that promote the recovery and conservation efforts of key terrestrial species and their habitats along their range. Proposed activities can be implemented on the local, national, or regional (transnational) level, and can involve more than one priority species. Species should meet the criteria to be listed either as “Endangered” or “Threatened” on the ESA, or as “Critically Endangered,” “Endangered,” or “Vulnerable” on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List. Species listed as “Data Deficient” or “Extinct in Wild” on the IUCN Red List are not eligible under this NOFO. Conservation Stewardship: This category seeks to support projects that assist communities living in and along critical wildlife corridors and strongholds, by building on their traditional land-use practices, governance principles, ethnobiological knowledge and reduce their costs of living with wildlife. Proposed activities can be implemented on the local, national or regional (transnational) level. Projects are to be implemented in or around natural protected areas, biological corridors, and recovery units in: Mexico, Central America, and South America.

From the federal Assistance Listing. Read the full listing on SAM.gov.

Open opportunities

No opportunity under this program is open or forecast on Grants.gov right now. Programs often post once a year, so the funding history below shows what to expect.

Rules from the program listing

Who can apply

Applicants under this program can be multi-national secretariats, foreign governments, U.S. and foreign non-profits, non-governmental organizations, community and Indigenous organizations, and U.S. and foreign public and private institutions of higher education. Individuals are not eligible to apply under this Notice of Funding Opportunity. In addition, tuition for individuals and field expenses for projects carried out in support of masters, doctorate degrees, and post-doctorate research are not eligible under this Notice of Funding Opportunity.

What the money can and cannot pay for

No new funding for this program is expected. Assistance Listing will remain active to allow Bureau to close all currently open awards and report any associated amendments to government-wide systems that require the identification of an active number as a key reporting element. Funds provided under this program will not be used for the following activities: the purchase of firearms or ammunitions; buying of intelligence information or paying informants; gathering information by persons who conceal their true identity; law enforcement operations that prompt suspects to carry out illegal activities so they may be arrested (entrapment); or any activity that would circumvent sanctions, treaties, laws or regulations of either the U.S. or the country in which the activity would occur. Funds may not be used to provide material support or resources to individuals, entities, or organizations of countries that have been identified by the U.S. Department of State as state sponsors of terrorism. The countries currently identified are: Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria. This program is administered in compliance with the Federal Grants and Cooperative Agreements Act of 1977, as amended. These funds may not be used towards training U.S. Federal Government personnel.;

Matching requirements

This program has no statutory formula. Matching requirements are not applicable to this assistance listing. MOE requirements are not applicable to this assistance listing.

Award range and average, in the agency's words

Program seeks to fund approximately six awards, each with a total budget not to exceed $200,000 over two years.

Examples of funded projects

Fiscal Year2025: Implementing regional and national strategies for human-jaguar coexistence in the Peruvian Amazon.Fiscal Year2026: No new projects were funded in FY2026.

Quoted from the program's federal Assistance Listing. The notice of funding opportunity is the official source for each competition's rules.

Who usually wins

Nonprofits received 68% of the money, colleges and universities 2.3%.

By state

3 states have a page for this program: those that received at least $1 million or 10 awards. They are New York, California and Texas.

Award amounts are federal obligations reported to USAspending.gov for fiscal 2021 to 2025; see how our data works.