We are running this funding opportunity on the new UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) Funding Service so ensure that your organisation is registered. You cannot apply on the Joint Electronic Submissions (Je-S) system.
The project lead is responsible for completing the application process on the Funding Service, but we expect all team members and project partners to contribute to the application.
Only the lead research organisation can submit an application to UKRI.
Watch our recording on how to apply for an opportunity in the Funding Service.
To apply
Select ‘Start application’ near the beginning of this Funding finder page.
- Confirm you are the project lead.
- Sign in or create a Funding Service account. To create an account, select your organisation, verify your email address, and set a password. If your organisation is not listed, email support@funding-service.ukri.org
Allow at least 10 working days for your organisation to be added to the Funding Service. We strongly suggest that if you are asking UKRI to add your organisation to the Funding Service to enable you to apply to this funding opportunity, that you also create an organisation Administration Account. This will be needed to allow the acceptance and management of any grant that might be offered to you.
- Answer questions directly in the text boxes. You can save your answers and come back to complete them or work offline and return to copy and paste your answers. If we need you to upload a document, follow the upload instructions in the Funding Service. All questions and assessment criteria are listed in the ‘How to apply’ section on this Funding finder page.
- Allow enough time to check your application in ‘read-only’ view before sending to your research office.
- Send the completed application to your research office for checking. They will return it to you if it needs editing.
- Your research office will submit the completed and checked application to UKRI.
Where indicated, you can also demonstrate elements of your responses in visual form if relevant. You should:
- use images sparingly and only to convey important information that cannot easily be put into words
- insert each new image onto a new line
- provide a descriptive legend for each image immediately underneath it (this counts towards your word limit)
- ensure that files are smaller than 5MB and in JPEG, JPG, JPE, JFI, JIF, JFIF, PNG, GIF, BMP or WEBP format
Your application may be rejected if images are provided without a descriptive legend in the text box or are used to replace text that could be input into the text box.
Watch our research office webinars about the new Funding Service.
For more guidance on the Funding Service, see:
References
Applications should be self-contained, and hyperlinks should only be used to provide links directly to reference information. To ensure the information’s integrity is maintained, where possible, persistent identifiers such as digital object identifiers should be used. Assessors are not required to access links to carry out assessment or recommend a funding decision. You should use your discretion when including references and prioritise those most pertinent to your application.
Reference should be included in the appropriate question section of the application and be easily identifiable by the assessors, for example (Smith, Research Paper, 2019).
You must not include links to web resources to extend your application.
Generative artificial intelligence (AI)
Use of generative AI tools to prepare funding applications is permitted, however, caution should be applied.
For more information see our policy on the use of generative AI in application and assessment.
Deadline
We must receive your application by 3 April 2025 at 4:00pm UK time.
You will not be able to apply after this time. Make sure you are aware of and follow any internal institutional deadlines.
Following the submission of your application to the funding opportunity, your application cannot be changed, and applications will not be returned for amendment. If your application does not follow the guidance, it may be rejected.
Personal data
Processing personal data
Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), as part of UKRI, will need to collect some personal information to manage your Funding Service account and the registration of your funding applications.
We will handle personal data in line with UK data protection legislation and manage it securely. For more information, including how to exercise your rights, read our privacy notice.
Sensitive information
If you or a core team member need to tell us something you wish to remain confidential, email GPSF@nerc.ukri.org
Include in the subject line: Global Partnerships Seedcorn Fund 2025; sensitive information; [your Funding Service application number].
Typical examples of confidential information include:
- individual is unavailable until a certain date (for example due to parental leave)
- declaration of interest
- additional information about eligibility to apply that would not be appropriately shared in the ‘Applicant and team capability’ section
- conflict of interest for UKRI to consider in reviewer or panel participant selection
For information about how UKRI handles personal data, read UKRI’s privacy notice.
Publication of outcomes
NERC, as part of UKRI, will publish the outcomes of this funding opportunity on What NERC has funded.
If your application is successful, we will publish some personal information on the UKRI Gateway to Research.
Summary
Word limit: 550
In plain English, provide a summary we can use to identify the most suitable experts to assess your application.
We usually make this summary publicly available on external-facing websites, therefore do not include any confidential or sensitive information. Make it suitable for a variety of readers, for example:
- opinion-formers
- policymakers
- the public
- the wider research community
Guidance for writing a summary
Clearly describe your proposed work in terms of:
- context
- the challenge the project addresses
- aims and objectives
- how you will develop your new partnership with your international partner(s)
- potential applications and benefits
Core team
List the key members of your team and assign them roles from the following:
- project lead (PL)
- project co-lead (UK) (PcL)
- project co-lead (international) (PcL (I))
- researcher co-lead (RcL)
- research and innovation associate
- grant manager
- professional enabling staff
- specialist
- technician
- visiting researcher
Only list one individual as project lead.
The project lead is responsible for setting up and completing the application process on the Funding Service.
The project co-lead international may only be used for collaborators based at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) and in Norway, where NERC has collaboration agreements in place. We do not otherwise accept project co-lead (international) applicants.
UKRI has introduced a new addition to the ‘specialist’ role type. Public contributors such as people with lived experience can now be added to an application.
Find out more about UKRI’s core team roles in funding applications.
Your international project partner or partners should not be listed in your core team as a project co-lead (international) but should instead be named in the project partner section and their role included in all other relevant sections (vision, approach, applicant and team capability to deliver, international partnerships).
Application questions
Vision
Word limit: 1,000
What are you hoping to achieve with your proposed work?
What the assessors are looking for in your response
Explain how your proposed work:
- has the potential to advance current understanding, or generate new knowledge, thinking or discovery within or beyond the field or area
- is timely given current trends, context, and needs
Within this section we also expect you to:
- describe the aim of your new international partnership(s)
References may be included within this section.
You may demonstrate elements of your responses in visual form if relevant. Further details are provided in the ‘How to apply’ section.
Approach
Word limit: 1,000
How are you going to deliver your proposed work?
What the assessors are looking for in your response
Explain how you have designed your approach so that it:
- is effective and appropriate to achieve your objectives
- is feasible, and comprehensively identifies any risks to delivery and how they will be managed
- uses a clearly written and transparent methodology (if applicable)
- summarises the previous work and describes how this will be built upon and progressed (if applicable)
- will maximise translation of outputs into outcomes and impacts
- describes how your, and if applicable your team’s, research environment (in terms of the place and relevance to the project) will contribute to the success of the work
Within this section we also expect you to:
- describe the specific intellectual and material contributions of each partner
References may be included within this section.
You may demonstrate elements of your responses in visual form if relevant. Further details are provided in the ‘How to apply’ section.
Applicant and team capability to deliver
Word limit: 1,650
Why are you the right individual or team to successfully deliver the proposed work?
What the assessors are looking for in your response
Evidence of how you, and if relevant your team, have:
- the relevant experience (appropriate to career stage) to deliver the proposed work
- the right balance of skills and expertise to cover the proposed work
- the appropriate leadership and management skills to deliver the work and your approach to develop others
- contributed to developing a positive research environment and wider community
You may demonstrate elements of your responses in visual form if relevant. Further details are provided in the ‘How to apply’ section.
The word limit for this section is 1,650 words: 1,150 words to be used for R4RI modules (including references) and, if necessary, a further 500 words for Additions.
Use the Résumé for Research and Innovation (R4RI) format to showcase the range of relevant skills you and, if relevant, your team (project co-leads, researchers, technicians, specialists, partners and so on) have and how this will help deliver the proposed work. You can include individuals’ specific achievements but only choose past contributions that best evidence their ability to deliver this work.
Complete this section using the R4RI module headings listed. Use each heading once and include a response for the whole team, see the UKRI guidance on R4RI. You should consider how to balance your answer, and emphasise where appropriate the key skills each team member brings:
- contributions to the generation of new ideas, tools, methodologies, or knowledge
- the development of others and maintenance of effective working relationships
- contributions to the wider research and innovation community
- contributions to broader research or innovation users and audiences and towards wider societal benefit
Additions
Provide any further details relevant to your application. This section is optional and can be up to 500 words. You should not use it to describe additional skills, experiences, or outputs, but you can use it to describe any factors that provide context for the rest of your R4RI (for example, details of career breaks if you wish to disclose them).
This section should not be used as extra space for the R4RI. Applicants are warned that panellists will be asked to disregard anything over the 1,650 word limit that is not being used for additional context, for example, career breaks or disabilities.
Complete this as a narrative. Do not format it like a CV. Applicants are reminded that as a signatory of DORA, NERC recognises a range of scientific outputs in addition to academic publication and emphasis should not be placed on citations and H-indices, which can be very field-specific.
References may be included within this section.
The roles in funding applications policy has descriptions of the different project roles.
Ethics and responsible research and innovation (RRI)
Word limit: 500
What are the ethical or RRI implications and issues relating to the proposed work? If you do not think that the proposed work raises any ethical or RRI issues, explain why.
What the assessors are looking for in your response
Demonstrate that you have identified and evaluated:
- the relevant ethical or responsible research and innovation considerations
- how you will manage these considerations
- environmental ethical considerations
- consideration for preventing environmental harm and enhancing environmental benefit in line with NERC’s responsible business statement
If you are collecting or using data, identify:
- any legal and ethical considerations of collecting, releasing or storing the data including consent, confidentiality, anonymisation, security and other ethical considerations and, in particular, strategies to not preclude further re-use of data
- formal information standards with which your study will comply
You may demonstrate elements of your responses in visual form if relevant. Further details are provided in the ‘How to apply’ section.
International partnership
Word limit: 1,000
How will you develop and sustain your new international partnership?
What the assessors are looking for in your response
Explain how you will develop your international partnership(s) by:
- describing how the primary international partnership is with a new partner
- demonstrating how the international partner brings expertise that is not available within the UK
- describing your plans for long-term collaboration including:
- how the partnership will develop beyond the duration of the grant
- any potential future funding opportunities targeted
- the likely research subject of a potential follow-on grant
Within this section we also expect you to:
- clearly describe which international partnership is new and which is an existing collaboration, if you have included more than one international partner
You may demonstrate elements of your responses in visual form if relevant. Further details are provided in the ‘How to apply’ section.
New investigators
Word limit: 10
Are you a new investigator?
What the assessors are looking for in your response
If you are applying as a new investigator as defined in the NERC research grants and fellowships handbook, then you should answer ‘Yes’ in the text box. If not, then answer ‘No’.
FAPESP or NSTC joint funding
Word limit: 10
Are you submitting your application with either FAPESP or NSTC joint funding?
What the assessors are looking for in your response
If not, then enter ‘N/A’ into the text box, mark this section as complete and move on to the next section.
If your application is seeking co-funding for international partners from either Sao Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP) in Brazil or the National Science and Technology Council (NSTC) in Taiwan, you should provide the name of the agreement in the text box.
You should include further detail of the team, the collaboration and the added value to the project in the appropriate sections of the application, not here.
For joint funding with FAPESP you should include the SAGe visualization from FAPESP’s funding system as a single PDF attachment in this section.
For joint funding with NSTC include the completed NSTC budget form as a single PDF attachment in this section.
Any involvement of international project co-leads from IIASA or Norway should be included in core team, applicant and team capability to deliver and any other relevant sections and are not applicable to this question.
Upload guidance
Upload a single PDF containing the international funder documentation ensuring it is no larger than 8MB, if applicable.
For the file name, use the unique Funding Service number the system gives to your application when you create an application, immediately followed by the words ‘international partnerships’. Then use the ‘upload’ button.
Unless specifically requested, do not include any personal data within the attachment.
Once you have uploaded, mark this section as complete and move to the next one.
Project partners
Add details about project partners’ contributions.
A project partner is a collaborating organisation who will have an integral role in the proposed research. This may include direct (cash) or indirect (in-kind) contributions such as expertise, staff time or use of facilities. Project partners may be in industry, academia, third sector or government organisations in the UK or overseas, including partners based in the EU.
Add the following project partner details:
- organisation name and address (searchable via a drop-down list or enter the organisation’s details manually, as applicable)
- project partner contact name and email address
- type of contribution (direct or in-direct) and its monetary value
If a detail is entered incorrectly and you have saved the entry, remove the specific project partner record and re-add it with the correct information.
For audit purposes, UKRI requires formal collaboration agreements to be put in place if an award is made.
Project partners: letters of support
Word limit: 10
Upload a single PDF containing the letters or emails of support from each partner you named in the ‘Project partners’ section. These should be uploaded in English or Welsh only.
What the assessors are looking for in your response
Enter the words ‘attachment supplied’ in the text box. Each letter or email you provide should:
- confirm the partner’s commitment to the project
- clearly explain the value, relevance, and possible benefits of the work to them
- describe any additional value that they bring to the project
- have a page limit of two sides A4 per partner
Save letters or emails of support from each partner in a single PDF no bigger than 8MB.
For the file name, use the unique Funding Service number the system gives you when you create an application, followed by the words ‘project partner’.
The Funding Service will provide document upload details when you apply.
Ensure you have prior agreement from project partners so that, if you are offered funding, they will support your project as indicated in the contributions template.
For audit purposes, UKRI requires formal collaboration agreements to be put in place if an award is made.
Do not provide letters of support from host and project co-leads’ research organisations.
Facilities
Word limit: 250
Does your proposed research require the support and use of a facility?
What the assessors are looking for in your response
If you will need to use a research council facility, follow your proposed facility’s normal access request procedures. Ensure you have prior agreement so that if you are offered funding, they will support the use of their facility on your project.
For each requested facility you will need to provide the:
- name of facility, copied and pasted from the facility information list (DOCX, 42KB)
- proposed usage or costs, or costs per unit where indicated on the facility information list
- confirmation you have their agreement where required
If you have to attach a facility form, then upload it as a PDF. If you need to upload multiple forms, then combine them into a single PDF.
Facilities should only be named if they are on the facility information list. If you will not need to use a facility, then you will be able to indicate this in the Funding Service.
Upload guidance
Upload a single PDF containing facility forms ensuring it is no larger than 8MB, if applicable.
For the file name, use the Funding Service number the system gives to your application when you create an application, immediately followed by the words ‘facility forms’. Then use the ‘upload’ button.
Unless specifically requested, do not include any personal data within the attachment.
Once you have uploaded, mark this section as complete and move to the next one.
Data management and sharing
Word limit: 500
How will you manage and share data collected or acquired through the proposed research?
What the assessors are looking for in your response
Provide a data management plan that clearly details how you will comply with UKRI’s published data sharing policy, which includes detailed guidance notes.
Indicate:
- which NERC data centre is required to archive the data
- whether the total volume of data is likely to be larger than 1TB
- any other detail on how you will comply with NERC data policy
Resources and cost justification
Word limit: 1,000
What will you need to deliver your proposed work and how much will it cost?
What the assessors are looking for in your response
Justify the application’s more costly resources, in particular:
- project staff
- significant travel for field work or collaboration (but not regular travel between collaborating organisations)
- any consumables beyond typical requirements, or that are required in exceptional quantities
- all facilities and infrastructure costs
- all resources that have been costed as ‘Exceptions’
Assessors are not looking for detailed costs or a line-by-line breakdown of all project resources. Overall, they want to be assured that:
- all resources are comprehensive, appropriate, and justified
- the project will make optimal use of resources to achieve the intended outcomes
- maximise potential outcomes and impacts
