Call for Applications: MRC-AHRC Global Public Health Partnership Awards! Deadline: 8 June 2017

Applications are open for MRC-AHRC Global Public Health Partnership Awards, offering a unique opportunity for the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and the Medical Research Council (MRC) to launch a global public health initiative that responds to the challenge of bringing together expertise in medical science and health interventions in developing countries, with an understanding of local knowledge and history, cultural dynamics, community engagement, and trust.

The overarching driver of this partnership building activity is to develop inter-disciplinary research capacity and capability in both the UK and developing countries, jointly and collaboratively and across career stages. The aim is to generate reciprocal benefits through integrating understanding of cultures and histories into medical and public health challenges in a global context and to equip the next generation of researchers to work collaboratively and blend scientific, cultural and policy research.

The aim of this activity is to build inter-disciplinary research capability and to support research innovation across the MRC and AHRC communities. Successful applications will build and strengthen UK and international research collaboration and partnerships for global public health benefit. In order not to limit the potential for inter-disciplinary innovation under this call the call is open to proposals addressing any global public health issue affecting low and middle countries.

Eligible Activities

The following activities are permissible under this partnership grant scheme:

• establishing Inter-disciplinary collaborative partnerships or consortia
• developing strategy to strengthen research activity across the field
• knowledge sharing across research departments and/or between Institutions and across sectoral boundaries both within the UK and with LMIC based colleagues
• small scale/pilot/proof of principle/exploratory/ higher risk inter-disciplinary projects to explore innovative boundary crossing collaborations
• cross-disciplinary (and cross-cultural / language) literature reviews/ research synthesis/ evidence analysis or integrative data sharing and analysis
• widening/ extending the disciplinary breadth of existing teams / partnerships (e.g. through placements, embedding, ethnographic research)
• career development, inter-disciplinary skills enhancement and capacity building
• establishing shared infrastructure, for example staff, systems, equipment, data, seminars, workshops. This could include a co-ordinated set of needs-led and complementary networking activities (including outreach work and travel) with a defined output

Funds Available

• The total funding available for this call from MRC and AHRC is £2million
• Costs of up to £200,000 fEC could be appropriate, although the scale of the awards will be flexible to meet the needs of the research. The funding requested should be commensurate with the activities intended for these projects.
• The duration of these grants should be between 18-24 months.

Eligibility Criteria

All proposals under this call must meet all of the following criteria:

• Be highly inter-disciplinary bringing together significant insights and UK research expertise from the arts/ humanities and the medical/ health sciences. The added value from the inter-disciplinary approach should be clearly explained in the proposal.
• Be internationally collaborative involving researchers, practitioners, communities, patients, and/or other non-academic partners in one or more low or middle income country.
• Focus on global public health issues in LMICs with the potential to benefit the health of people in LMICs.

How to Apply

Applications must be submitted online via given website.

Eligible Countries: United Kingdom, Armenia, Bolivia, Cape Verde, Cameroon, Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Egypt, El Salvador, Georgia, Ghana, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Micronesia, Moldova, Mongolia, Morocco, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Philippines, Samoa, Sri Lanka, Swaziland, Syria, Tokelau, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Viet Nam, West Bank and Gaza Strip.

For more information, please visit MRC-AHRC Global Public Health Partnership Awards.