Collaborative Projects:

Most agricultural crop development projects supported by the Trust are likely to be collaborations between institutes in developing and developed countries. In such cases, the Trust expects some aspects of the work to be carried out in the laboratories of the developing country partner or in that region. The Trust's objective for projects is that they should bring the power of modern genetic methods, such as marker-assisted breeding techniques, to the improvement of crops in the developing world. The Trust will work with the collaborative partners to design the project and to set in place appropriate funding for staff and consumables. There is no expressed limit to the scale of funding, but the normal expectation would be for support on the scale of one or two scientists/technologists working for a maximum of two years with appropriate training or working periods in more advanced laboratories. Where appropriate, funding for these individuals may be through the Kirkhouse Trust Fellowship scheme.

The Trust's area for research support is legumes, and there needs to be an exceptional reason for it to agree to provide support for research projects on other crops.

Project Application Process

Kirkhouse Trust has a staged application process for approving research project grants:

Applicants are asked initially to submit an outline application. This will include both a brief description of the scientific aims of the project together with the proposed methodology and time scale to achieve these; and an outline budget to enable the funding implications to be gauged. The Trust will review the outline application and either decide to reject it at this stage, or invite the applicant/s to move to:

Applicants will be asked to liaise closely with a Trust Administrator to expand on the outline project application and to work up a more detailed budget. It is likely that a plant scientist will liaise with the Principle Investigator (PI) to discuss the proposed programme of research and firm up on a timeline and milestones.

When the detailed research project and budget have been agreed, a contract document will be drawn up by the Trust for signing by representatives of the Trust and the PI's home institution.

The Trust may elect to approve the budget for the first year of the project initially, and to fix the budget for future years based on the experience of the first year. The Trust always provides grants on a 'cost recovery basis' that is, if any grant money is not spent it must be returned to the Trust at the end of the funding year or offset against the project budget for the next year.

It is Trust policy to fund only economy air travel costs.