Deadline: 31 July 2020
Proposals are invited for short-term projects addressing and mitigating the health, social, economic, cultural and environmental impacts of the COVID-19 outbreak in Low and Middle Income Countries.
This call is funded through the Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) and the Newton Fund. These Funds address global challenges through disciplinary and interdisciplinary research and strengthen capability for research and innovation within both the UK and developing countries, providing an agile response to emergencies where there is an urgent research need.
This GCRF/Newton Fund call focuses upon mitigating both short and longer-term impacts of COVID-19 on health, wellbeing, community cohesion, and economic prosperity. In the health sphere, mental health, health economics, and malnutrition are all impacted by the virus and require interdisciplinary research. As well as a health emergency, COVID-19 highlights the importance of understanding underlying determinants of risk in LMICs, including the quality of public messaging and community engagement, the vulnerabilities of those living in refugee and IDP (internally displaced person) camps and informal settlements, higher incidences of domestic violence resulting from social isolation, remittances from overseas, impacts upon global food systems and supply chains and severely restricted access to education.
UKRI will support excellent proposals which meet at least one of the following:
- New research or innovation with a clear pathway to impact on policy or practice that has the potential (within the period of the award) to deliver a significant contribution to the understanding of, response to, and recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic in a developing country context.
- Supports the manufacture and/or wide scale adoption of an intervention with significant potential for impact in developing countries.
- Gathers critical data and resources quickly for future research use.
Proposals Should
- Describe the unmet need developing countries are facing with COVID-19, and how the primary benefit of your research will be realised in these countries.
- Focus on working in close partnership with LMICs to enable the best researchers and innovators in the UK and developing countries to jointly contribute to recovery from this global crisis.
- Clearly demonstrate how the proposed research meets the criteria for ODA compliance and Gender Equality.
- Explain the level of urgency, and why the activity is important now.
- Demonstrate that the proposal has the necessary critical mass to make a difference, including the global partnerships that will be necessary to realise impact in LMIC countries.
- Demonstrate their commitment to minimizing the burden their project will place on others. Given the urgency and the demands the development of the proposal and carrying out of the project will place on others, applicants should be mindful of the burden they place on individuals and organisations, both in the UK and overseas. This includes consideration of how to conduct fieldwork and other activities.
- Demonstrate a clear route to impact within the timescale of the project. Where relevant, this should include demonstration of links to relevant decision makers both in the UK and overseas.
- Give an estimate of the resources required (within 10%).
- Name the team that will run this and describe their ability and capacity to deliver including details of how research would be conducted under current restrictions (travel, social distancing) and highlight any requirements for personal protective equipment.
- Provide evidence that the host institutions support the proposal and that the research can be carried out under present institutional restriction.
Funding Information
- 80% of the full economic cost (fEC) for Research Council funding.
- Project length: up to 18 months
Health Impacts
- In parallel to this agile responsive call, a strategic ODA Cross-Departmental call is being explored by UKRI/DHSC/DFID for research proposals addressing COVID-19 in LMICs. This strategic call will be focused on specific health priorities outlined in the WHO R&D Blueprint COVID-19 Roadmap, addressing gaps identified in the current health research agenda through a consultative process that involved experts from across the world. For proposals likely to fit within this remit, please await further notice about this strategic opportunity before applying to the Agile UKRI call.
- Topics likely to be in scope are:
- Epidemiological studies
- Clinical characterization and management
- Infection prevention and control including health care workers’ protection
- Social Sciences in the Outbreak Response (access to health care services/vaccination etc) NOT socio-economic generally
UKRI is looking for
- Research and innovation is at the heart of the global response to COVID-19. Focused upon, and closely working in partnership with LMICs, the GCRF and Newton Fund are very well placed to enable the best researchers in the UK and internationally to respond and recover from this global crisis.
- This agile response programme enables the GCRF and Newton Fund to build on their current portfolios addressing the Sustainable Development Goals in order to help mitigate negative impacts in developing countries of the COVID-19 outbreak. Proposals supported through this programme will contribute to the strategic aims of the 6 portfolio areas:
- Resilience
- Security Protracted Conflict, Refugee Crises and Forced Displacement
- Cities and Sustainable Infrastructure
- Food Systems
- Education
- Global Health
Eligibility Criteria
- You can apply for Innovate UK funding if you are a UK based business. All kinds of businesses can apply – from pre-startup and new companies to large multi-nationals.
- You can apply for funding if you want to do one or more of the following:
- to test the feasibility of your idea and make sure it will work
- create a new product, process or service, or improve an existing one, through research and development
- work with other businesses or research organisations on collaborative projects.
- You will need to show that you can start work within 4 weeks of the funding being confirmed.
- An individual can be Principal Investigator (PI) on only one bid at any one time. You may support others as co-investigator, as long as you have the capacity/bandwidth to do so without detriment to the project you lead.
- You may be asked to become part of wider consortia or join with already existing efforts.
- UKRI strongly encourage applicants from LMIC countries to apply to and participate in this call. LMIC country Principal Investigators from an organisation that lead or have previously led and held UKRI grants and have undergone Je-S registration and due diligence checks are eligible to be lead applicants for this call.
- The LMIC-based organisation must be able to receive and manage funds from UKRI via a grant and must ensure their application complies with local regulations and has the necessary local approvals.
For more information, visit https://www.ukri.org/funding/funding-opportunities/ukri-gcrf-newton-fund-agile-response-call-to-address-covid-19/