Funding Opportunities

Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)

http://www.bbsrc.ac.uk/funding

Specific initiatives open for applications across the whole of BBSRC including opportunities in working with business and international funding: http://www.bbsrc.ac.uk/funding/opportunities (updated regularly).

Call for proposals: Resilience of the UK Food System in a Global Context

Application deadline: 27 October 2015, 4pm

Summary

The Global Food Security (GFS) Programme will soon be announcing a new 5-year interdisciplinary programme of research. The programme has been co-designed by BBSRC, ESRC, NERC, Defra, FSA and the Scottish Government, in partnership with wider stakeholders, and will address a major food security challenge: ‘Resilience of the UK food system in a global context’.

Funding

BBSRC, NERC & ESRC are contributing £14M and further contributions are being considered by other GFS partners.

Themes

The programme will integrate biological, environmental and social sciences to support interdisciplinary projects addressing one or more of the following key themes (these are all interlinked and proposals that address aspects of more than one theme are strongly encouraged):

1. Optimising the productivity, resilience and sustainability of agricultural systems and landscapes

At the core of this theme is understanding the relationship and trade-offs between resilience, sustainability to deliver production systems balancing the provision of food with other ecosystem services. This will help address the challenge of feeding a growing population sustainably; ensuring improved environmental, social and economic outcomes.

2. Optimising resilience of food supply chains both locally and globally

This theme is focused on understanding the economic, environmental, biological and social factors affecting the food supply chain, and the interplay between these, to increase resilience of the food system at a local-to-global level.

3. Influencing food choice for health, sustainability and resilience at the individual and household level

Central to this theme is understanding the drivers behind food choices and how these impact on the wider food system and production, in order to identify interventions that result in in provision of nutritious and sustainable food in more resilient and equitable ways.

Aim

Through interdisciplinary research calls, community building events and a suite of impact activities, this programme aims to build a portfolio of research which will deliver tangible outcomes that are greater than the sum of its parts.

Programme calls

The first of two programme calls will be launched in September 2015.

Each proposal must integrate biological, environmental and social sciences and can be led by any of these disciplines.

Event

A community building event was held in London on 20 July 2015 to give researchers an opportunity to learn more about the call, meet colleagues from other disciplines and initiate partnerships in advance of the call launch in September.

Contact

Evangelia Kougioumoutzi

evangelia.kougioumoutzi@bbsrc.ac.uk

+44 1793 41323

Knowledge Based Bio-Economy (KBBE)

http://cordis.europa.eu/fp7/kbbe/home_en.html

Objective

The primary aim of funding the 'Food, Agriculture and Fisheries, and Biotechnology' research theme under the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) is to build a European Knowledge Based Bio-Economy (KBBE) .

What will be funded?

The EU Member States have earmarked more than € 1.9 billion for funding this theme over the duration of FP7.

The 'Food, Agriculture and Fisheries, and Biotechnology' theme is built around three major activities':

Research funding from Defra

https://www.gov.uk/research-funding-from-defra

Defra provides funding for a large number of research or evidence projects every year, in a number of ways, including:

- competitions advertised on this site, either for individual projects or in the form of multiple project research requirements documents

- non-competitive arrangements, mainly at our science agencies and other major contractors where we need to maintain expertise and facilities

- in partnership with others, such as through LINK programmes