Deadline: 14-Oct-22
Building on the closer economic ties enabled by the UK-Australia Free Trade Agreement (FTA), the UK in Australia network is issuing a call for bids for planning and executing a project to increase supply chain resilience collaboration between the UK and Australia, and potentially third countries, as well as businesses in critical sectors.
Scope of Work
- Building on this joint initiative, we are looking to fund a project that will demonstrate how the UK, in collaboration with industry and other governments and organisations in the Indo-Pacific, can improve the resilience of supply chains in critical sectors (which could include but is not limited to semiconductors, telecoms, critical minerals in line with the recently-published Critical Minerals Strategy, or medical goods).
Funding Information
- Proposals should be between £12,000 – £25,000 ($20,000 – $42,000 AUD).
- All funding must be activity-based (i.e. not for general support staff costs (admin, finance support), office rental etc.).
- We welcome joint bids by more than one implementing organisation where these will result in a more interdisciplinary approach to the project.
Examples of Potential Projects
- Work to identify alternative sources of supply for critical goods, and create a shared list of producers to improve business awareness of diversification options, taking advantage of FTA tariff reductions for goods from the UK where possible.
- Proposals for potential alternative sources of supply for critical goods or their precursors in third countries, and workshops to engage key stakeholders across government and industry on how we might incentivise these sources of supply.
- Survey of businesses in critical sectors on key perceived supply chain risks, mitigations they are currently taking, and what role they want to see for government in mitigating these risks.
- Organisation of a stress test exercise on a critical supply chain. This could simulate a series of potential external shocks to the supply chain, and convene key government, industry and academic stakeholders to chart likely impacts and responses. It should result in a series of policy proposals for how UK and Australian government and industry can work to make that supply chain more resilient. The findings could then be presented as part of an additional series of events.
Selection Criteria
Bids will be assessed against the following criteria:
- Project design: Feasibility of activities and outputs including the capacity of implementing organisation to deliver outcomes.
- Impact: Supporting identifiable, meaningful activities to enhance impact of the project.
- Scalability: The potential for the project to act as a building block for subsequent FTA implementation activity.
- Viability and risks: Clear engagement/buy-in of key stakeholders. Robust analysis of key risks and a plan of action to manage and mitigate those risks.
- Value for money: Comparable and reasonable costs against the scale of achievable outcomes.
For more information, visit https://www.gov.uk/government/news/call-for-bids-australia-networks-uk-trade-partnerships-fund
