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The BioInnovate Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) at its first meeting held on 18-19 August 2010 shortlisted 15 concept notes to be further developed into 7 full proposals comprising innovation consortia of related projects.
Successful applicants were invited and facilitated by the Program Management Office to hold meetings within their respective consortia, so as to discuss modalities of developing full proposals for funding consideration in September 2010.
Full proposals were developed by successful consortium from the first call for concept notes from the region that are led by public and/or private entities (including small scale enterprises and NGOs) in one of the six BioInnovate participating countries of Burundi, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. We are pleased to report that the BioInnovate Program has received all the 7 full proposals on related Innovation Project Consortia from the successful concept notes from the first Call on Adapting to Climate Change in Agriculture and the Environment in Eastern Africa. Four of the full innovation project consortia proposals are targeting crop productivity and resilience to climate change in small-scale farming systems (thematic area 1), and three are aiming at improving the efficiency of the agro-processing industry to add value to local bio-resources in a sustainable manner (thematic area 2) in Eastern Africa to bring impacts on the ground.
Each of the eligible full proposals will be independently evaluated by 3-4 peer-reviewers. The external peer-review evaluation process of the full proposals is scheduled to take place from 4 – 15 October, 2010. The reviewers of the full proposals are from the fields of biosciences and development, who are internationally recognized in the area of agricultural and environmental biosciences. All independent experts possess a high level of professional experience in the public or private sector in research and/or practice in biosciences innovation systems, with extensive experience in the Eastern Africa.
All the full proposals that meet the selection criteria will be presented to the TAC. The TAC will aim to create a balanced portfolio of projects, taking into account the objectives of the call, the quality of the proposals, and the advice from the evaluators as well as availability of funding. The TAC will make the final decisions on project selection for funding in its 2nd TAC meeting in late October 2010. Further Updates will be provided here as the process unfolds. Thank you to all who submitted full proposals to the BioInnovate Program. We will be communicating directly with you, on the outcome of the review process.
