Colombia

Country News

Published: March 3, 2026Funding OpportunitiesColombia Ecuador Ghana India Indonesia Morocco Pakistan Romania Senegal SierraLeone Tanzania Vietnam

Request for proposals for Transition to Scale innovations!

Grand Challenges Canada, through the Being Initiative, is investing in ready-to-scale innovations that address the root causes of young people’s distress before they escalate, strengthening the environments where they live,…

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Published: April 1, 2025BlogsColombia Ecuador Indonesia

Shifting Power in Youth Mental Health Research: Key Lessons from Global Researchers at the IAYMH Conference

Mental health ecosystems, which encompass both formal systems (like policies) and informal relationships (such as community interactions), play a crucial role in supporting population wellbeing. At the 7th International Association…

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Published: March 7, 2025BlogsColombia

Scaling Innovative Solutions for Children’s and Adolescents’ Mental Health

Last November, Being and Grand Challenges Canada participated in the first-ever Global Ministerial Conference on Ending Violence Against Children in Colombia. Together with our incredible partners—The Early Childhood Development Action…

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Country Focus

In Colombia, around 25% of teenagers face family dysfunction, often rooted in the country’s history of armed conflict, poverty, displacement, and intergenerational trauma. These systemic issues have weakened family structures and contributed to strained relationships, emotional invalidation, poor communication, and in some cases, violence within households. In this context, many young people experience significant mental health challenges, including depression, trauma, self-harm, and suicidal thoughts.

National policies have increasingly recognized the importance of youth mental health and wellbeing, emphasizing the role of families and schools as key environments for support. Programs aimed at promoting nurturing relationships and safe spaces for young people have gained momentum, creating a timely opportunity to test and scale innovative family based solutions.

Discover more insights from Colombia’s landscape analysis—download our report!

What we’re funding in Colombia

Proof-of-concept funding:

Proof-of-concept (POC) funding up to $250,000 CAD will be awarded to early-stage projects that can implement, test and refine solutions to country-specific personal, social, and/or environmental factors impacting young people’s mental health and wellbeing in one of the 12 countries.

In Colombia, we seek bold Proof-of-Concept ideas to strengthen family functioning. These innovative solutions should focus on addressing family conflict or violence for young people and their parents/caregivers

Transition-to-scale funding:

Transition-to-scale (TTS) funding between $300,000 CAD and $1,500,000 CAD will be awarded to support tested mental health promotion and prevention approaches that align with country-specific priorities along their scaling journey to help catalyze their sustainability and impact.

In Colombia, we seek bold Transition-to-Scale ideas to strengthen family functioning. These innovative solutions should focus on addressing family conflict or violence for young people and their parents/caregivers

Ecosystem catalyst funding:

Ecosystem catalyst (EC) funding between $200,000 CAD and $300,000 CAD will be awarded to organizations that can address priority barriers to scale, such as legislation, evidence, coordination, and mobilize demand to help mental health initiatives succeed and grow in one of 12 priority countries.

In Colombia, we’re funding EC projects that support implementation and accountability mechanisms for national youth mental health policies that are related to environments where youth spend time, such as schools and community settings.