FAPESP joins group on global climate change

One of the objectives of the Belmont Forum, composed of some of the world’s main research support agencies, is to change the direction of international collaboration in environmental research. A call for proposals was launched

By Elton Alisson

Agência FAPESP – On March 28, during Planet Under Pressure, a memorandum of understanding for collaborative action in global climate change research was signed by research financing agencies from the member nations of the Belmont Forum. A call for proposals was launched on April 15, aimed at supporting research in the areas of Coastal Vulnerability and Freshwater Security.

This group, comprising FAPESP and some of the world’s primary global climate change research financing agencies, aims to try to change the direction of international research collaboration on global climate change through joint calls for research.

Coordinated by the International Group of Funding Agencies for Global Change Research (IGFA), the Belmont Forum originated at a conference hosted by the US’ National Science Foundation (NSF) and the UK’s Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) in the North American city of Belmont, VA in 2009.

Representatives of research financing agencies from the G8 nations (the seven most developed nations plus Russia) participated in the first meeting. The participating agencies included France’s Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR) and institutions from Germany and Canada.

Beginning with the second meeting, held in London in 2010, the group began to recruit representatives from other nations including Brazil (represented by FAPESP), China, India and South Africa.

“We were in a hurry to make an agreement between the research support agencies that participate in the Belmont Forum so we could release a first call for proposals before RIO+20,” said Reynaldo Victoria, coordinator of the FAPESP Global Climate Change Research Program (PFPMCG) and the Foundation’s representative to the Belmont Forum.

According to Victoria, the agencies are free to decide whether to participate in the requests for proposals released by the Belmont Forum. However, at least three member nations must participate in any one RFP . The RFPs will be managed by one of the partner research support agencies.

The RFP concerning water, for example, is being coordinated by the ANR. The coastal vulnerability RFP is being led by the NSF.

“The financing agency recommended as leader of the RFP receives the proposals and is responsible for carrying out their peer reviews with members nominated by all the other agencies participating in the RFP,” Victoria told Agência FAPESP.

“The chosen agency also has the responsibility of organizing a panel of specialists composed of representatives of each of the agencies participating in the RFP, which analyzes and classifies the proposals,” explained Victoria.

The first call for proposals will be for € 20 million in resources, € 2.5 million of which will be invested by FAPESP. Of the money from FAPESP, € 1.5 million will be designated for research projects on water safety and € 1 million for research on coastal vulnerability. This money will be used to finance projects carried out by researchers in these fields from São Paulo State, in partnership with scientists from at least two other Forum member nations.

Proposals from researchers in São Paulo State should be submitted through the Belmont Forum web site after the release date (April 15); a second copy should be sent to FAPESP.

“We ask that the project proposals from São Paulo researchers be sent both via the Belmont Forum’s standard form as well as via the FAPESP proposal submission form so we can do the assessment,” said Patricia Brant Monteiro, FAPESP Director of Biological and Agrarian Sciences.

The analysis of the proposals will be carried out in two stages. In the first phase, interested researchers will submit pre-proposals for their projects, which will be evaluated by specialists. The Forum will then invite the authors of the selected pre-proposals to submit full proposals.

“This is a very interesting new idea for international cooperation that the research support agencies are implementing” said Monteiro. This year, FAPESP released a call for proposals through the BIOTA program together with the NSF. The cooperative model used by this program is similar to that adopted by the Belmont Forum.

In addition to FAPESP, the Belmont Forum’s memorandum of understanding for collaborative research was signed by Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), France’s ANR, Germany’s Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG), India’s Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES), the Japan Science and Technology Agency, the South African National Research Foundation (NRF), the UK’s NERC and Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the NSF.

The initiative also has the support of the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU), the International Social Science Council (ISSC), the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

FAPESP leads call for proposals

After the memorandum of understanding was signed, FAPESP Scientific Director and Belmont Forum Vice President Carlos Henrique de Brito Cruz gave a presentation on future collaborative research actions to be taken by the international group. Among these actions is the release of a call for research proposals on food security and bioenergy in 2013. This call for proposals is expected to be led by FAPESP.

This planned call for proposals came out of the most recent Belmont Forum meeting, when representatives of the support agencies from South Africa, India and several other nations showed interest in research on the relationship between bioenergy and the production of food and drinking water. These support agencies invited FAPESP to lead a call for proposals.

FAPESP accepted this invitation and proposed holding a workshop in Brazil in October or November 2012 to format a proposal that it will present at the next Forum meeting in India in January 2013. This proposal will outline how FAPESP will manage the call for proposals involving bioenergy and food and water security.

“Sustainable development is a challenge for the world and a topic full of opportunities for Brazil. FAPESP, with its three programs on biodiversity, bioenergy and global climate change, is positioned as an institution to participate actively, opening opportunities for researchers in São Paulo State,” said Brito Cruz at his London presentation.

Brito Cruz says that other topics to be covered in upcoming requests for research proposals by the Belmont Forum are likely to include the Arctic (no participation by Brazil, India and South Africa in this call) and the integration of scientific data to facilitate the use of this data in numerous fields of study.

According to Carlos Joly, BIOTA-FAPESP Director and Director of Policies and Thematic Programs in the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation’s Secretariat of Policy and R&D Programs, FAPESP will make an important philosophical contribution to the Belmont Forum, which intends to organize environmental research throughout the world.

“FAPESP’s research programs are examples of how to organize research networks on a chosen topic, uniting researchers with common objectives and using common electronic tools. An example is BIOTA, which can be an important philosophical contribution by FAPESP for the Belmont Forum’s proposal,” said Joly.