At its meeting in Washington in 2012, the INTO Board agreed to establish a Small Grants Programme (SGP).

The SGP is designed to provide small scale but catalytic support for the international family of INTO member organisations, working on heritage management and related community-led cultural programmes.

The first Small Grant was awarded in 2013 to the National Trust of Fiji to enable INTO Volunteer, Bart van Aller to travel to the Pacific Island and join the team as Built Heritage Advisor.

With seed funding provided by the INTO Small Grants Programme, Bart began assisting the Fiji National Trust and the local municipality in implementing the management for Fiji’s first World Heritage site, [the historical port town of Levuka] developing heritage trails, conducting community based research into historical buildings and supporting the creation of partnerships to further work on heritage buildings in Fiji.

Over 12 months he developed the Suva Heritage Trail, advised on the implementation of the Levuka World Heritage Site Management Plan, and reviewed proposals for the restoration of colonial properties.  Bart stayed in Fiji for three years and was also greatly involved in the restoration of listed buildings following the devastation of Tropical Cyclone Winston in 2016.

Work being undertaken by the National Trust of Fiji in the World Heritage Town of Levuka after Tropical Storm Winston in February 2016

• Transferring knowledge from experienced members to the less experienced members by supporting travel costs and out of pocket expenses for specialists or volunteers to provide advice;
• Providing support for internships arranged with experienced INTO members;
• Supporting fundraising and membership recruitment projects, and preparation of business plans and conservation plans; and
• Activities to strengthen financial management and member outreach.

One of the goals of the SGP is to enable organisations to use their Small Grant as leverage to obtain funding from other sources for their project.

To learn more about the SGP and have a guided tour of the application process watch this YouTube Video.

For further details, please see and study the SGP Guidelines.