Overview
Research Environment (RE) grants provide financial support for capacity strengthening and collaboration activities to develop and sustain medium- to long-term relationships proposed by applicant institutions in the UK and the partner countries. Proposals are designed by the Lead Applicant in the partner country, with the support of a UK Institution. RE are funded to respond to country need and meet the following criteria:
- Contribute to the country needs through structural and institutional change and correlate with overall GGP objectives.
- Provide the potential for future collaborations and the establishment of long-term relationships.
- Focus on capacity strengthening in areas of immediate relevance to partner countries academics, researchers and their sector.
- Have solid mechanisms for monitoring and evaluation and defined plans for sustainability.
- Each RE grant will provide a maximum of £50,000 and will support collaborative projects for up to 12 months.
- UK and Thailand will award up to 2 grants.
Objective
All RE grants will have the following three overarching objectives:
- Contribute to the development of systems, processes or structures that strengthen capacity and promote collaboration between the UK and the partner country. The proposal must include a description of how the collaboration and capacity strengthening activities will both contribute to structural change in a particular institution and how these could be relevant at a local/regional/national level. Lead applicants should indicate how they envisage this, including a sustainability plan. For example, when the activities focus on the delivery of training, structured mentoring and cascading activities should always be included in the activity plan.
- Establish new links or significantly develop existing links in areas relevant to the partner country and the UK. As well as supporting the research and innovation ecosystem between the partner country and the UK, RE should also aim to stimulate longer term links between participating institutions and other potential collaborators.
- Support international development objectives. The capacity strengthening activities are intended to support areas relevant to the economic development and welfare of partner countries, and link to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Eligibility
Proposals must fulfil the following criteria to be eligible for funding under this Programme:
- Each proposal must have both
- one Lead Applicant from the partner country; and
- one Lead Applicant from the UK,
submitting one joint application.
- Lead Applicants in the partner country and the UK must be based at one of the following Institutions:
– A not-for-profit higher education institution with the capacity to undertake high-quality research, including their Technology Transfer Offices.
– A Catapult Centre (in the case of the UK Principal Applicant)
– A not-for-profit research organisation with the capacity to undertake high-quality research.
The Lead Applicant’s institution in the partner country (the ‘Lead Institution’) must have the capacity to administer the grant and capacity must be confirmed in the support letter.
Lead Applicants can include in their proposals Associated Partners (from both the partner county and the UK) affiliated with:
- Research or higher education institutions
- Other Education Organisations/Charities/Foundations
- Not-for-profit organisations, including Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs)
- For-profit/commercial organisations, including small and medium enterprises (SMEs)
For-profit organisations are not eligible to apply as Lead Institutions. Furthermore, for-profit organisations are not eligible to receive any grant funds, except to cover travel-associated costs.
Please send an enquiry to [email protected] if you are in doubt about the eligibility of your organisation.
Eligibility checks will be applied to all applications after the grant call closes. Those which are not led by an eligible institution will be rejected during these checks.
Lead applicants from Thailand must be employed at academic institutions or research/ not for-profit organisations based in Thailand.
Thematic Priority Area:
Research Environment Linkages for Open Access AI in Healthcare
The project aims to have Thai and UK researchers share experiences and research resources to build the research environment linkage and develop strategic research policy for open access AI in Healthcare system. The output may be the structured consortium between academic sector, healthcare sector, digital start-up sector, other relevant partners in Thailand and UK. The output may also include policy brief for strategic research policy or recommended guideline/protocol for sharing best practices and health data for open access AI in Healthcare system.
Call Open: 18 August 2023
Deadline: 6 October 2023
Duration of the grant: Up to 12 months
Grant Amount: Maximum £50,000.
Grant Payment structure:
100% of the grant will be paid on signature of the Grant Agreement with the UK institution and Thai institution. 50% of the grant will be paid to UK institution and another 50% of the grant will be paid to Thai institution.
Contractual arrangements:
The British Council will sign the Grant Agreements with the Lead Institution in the UK and will disburse 50% (up to £25K) of the total grant award to the UK Lead applicant following contract award.
PMU-B will sign the Grant Agreement with the Lead Institution in Thailand and disburse the other 50% (up to £25K) of the total grant award to the Thai Lead application following contract award.
Submission Process
The deadline for the submission of applications is 6 October 2023 23:59 UK time,. Applications must be submitted online at [email protected]. We recommend avoiding submitting applications at the last minute.
The applications must clearly identify how the proposed activities will contribute to achieving/enhancing the overall objectives of the project.
Applications must include:
- A fully completed application form, including project description, ODA compliance, environmental and EDI statements, risk assessments, and applicant information.
- A detailed breakdown of the budget requested on the spreadsheet provided. For projects partnered with Egypt, the Egyptian Research Institution (Principal Investigator) should also provide a separate budget sheet, see Annex 1 for more guidance and template for the budget sheet.
- CVs of the academic leads on the project (max 2 pages). Egyptian Research Institutions are asked to use the specific form provided by STDF, our Egyptian funding partner, see Annex 1 for more guidance on this.
- Institutional contact details for grant and funding agreements.
- Information on how the proposed capacity strengthening activities will support the economic and social welfare of the most vulnerable populations in the partner countries where the Lead Applicant institution is based
- A detailed activity plan of activities, including timeline, milestones and division of roles and responsibilities
- A detailed plan for monitoring and evaluation
- A detailed plan for dissemination of the results and sustainability of the projects. This should include a description of the means and resources that will be used to sustain the activities beyond the duration of the grant
- Two letters of support from 1. the UK and 2. the partner country Lead Applicants’ institutions in English, on headed paper, signed by the Head of Institution, Head of Department or other person with appropriate delegated authority, expressing specific commitment to the proposed project, and capability of the Lead Applicant is particularly suited to the project content, and confirming the capacity of the institution to administer the grant. Please note that supporting letters must not be signed by the Lead Applicants.
If you experience problems with the application process, please contact [email protected] before the submission deadline. If you alert us to technical issues only after the deadline, we may not be able to take them into consideration when assessing the eligibility of your application.
Applicants are asked to confirm on the form that they have:
- Obtained permission to submit the proposal on behalf of the Lead Institution in the partner country and the UK institution(s). This must be confirmed by attaching Letters of Support from the respective institutions signed by the Head of institution or person with appropriate delegated authority.
- Confirmed the UK Lead Applicant’s Institution’s willingness to receive the funds and to sign a grant agreement with the British Council, also confirmed in the Letters of Support. Any alternative arrangements will be made clear in the call information.
- Complied with British Council policies on prevention of fraud, bribery, money laundering and addressed any other financial and reputational risk that may affect a transparent and fair grant award process.
