00:00:00:00 - 00:00:39:14 Unknown Get started. Kia ora koutou, ko Natalie Balfour tōku ingoa. Hello, everyone. I'm Natalie Balfour. I'm the head of research here at the Natural Hazards Commission Toka Tū Ake and this session today is a webinar on University Research Programme contestable round for 2027. So just a few things, housekeeping, before we get started, this is a recorded meeting, so we will just be trimming it a little bit at the start and end but will record the main part of the meeting and put it up on our website. 00:00:39:15 - 00:01:01:15 Unknown There's a Q&A button on your screen which you can put in the questions there, and we'll have a question and answer session at the end. We've got plenty of time for that. This should probably only take about 20, 30 minutes. And then you will notice that all your cameras have been automatically turned off and mics muted. 00:01:02:00 - 00:01:37:06 Unknown And I think that that's about it. So, share my screen. Hopefully you can all see that now. Thank you all for coming to the session today. It is really helpful to share this information with you and start the round. And, hopefully this will clear things up, especially for those who are, perhaps new to the Natural Hazards Commission research funding. 00:01:37:07 - 00:02:02:12 Unknown So what we'll cover in this session is a little bit about our research function here at the NHC, our goals, some important documents that will help you understand the areas of research that we're interested in. A little bit about some of the specific conditions and criteria for excellence and, a bit more about just general, contestable funding opportunities in each. 00:02:02:12 - 00:02:35:02 Unknown So we'll go into the main part of the session, we will talk about the university research program. And the process of application and timelines. Sorry, I won't go into the successful grants. I couldn't pull it together in time from last time, but that's all up on our website if you're interested in those. And then we'll go through how to apply them through our Smarty Grants portal and open it up for Q&A at the end. 00:02:35:03 - 00:03:02:04 Unknown So our resilience goal at the Natural Hazards Commission is to inform, enable and influence the choices and decisions that can reduce the vulnerability exposure of New Zealand's built environment to natural hazard events. I know it's a mouthful, but in simple terms it means we're looking at trying to build stronger homes on better land to try and reduce the impacts of natural hazards on people, properties and communities. 00:03:02:06 - 00:03:32:14 Unknown Our resilience goal is all outlined in the Resilience Strategy for Natural Hazard Risk Reduction, which is available on our website. There's two really key strategic documents in addition to that Resilience Strategy that you should have a look at to try and understand the function. There's the Research Strategy, and this really kind of guides how we're planning to take invest in research and build capability. 00:03:33:00 - 00:03:59:07 Unknown And also our Research Investment Priorities, which is about defining like the what we're interested in funding. And this was last updated in 2025, we tend to update it every few years. So the way I kind of think about these strategies is we've got the the Resilience Strategy, which is the why, the Research Strategy, which is the what in the research space. 00:03:59:07 - 00:04:14:14 Unknown Sorry that's really the how in the research space and the Research Investment Priorities, which is the what we are funding. So that's a really key document to look at for trying to formulate your proposals. 00:04:14:15 - 00:04:38:06 Unknown We have four key research themes that are outlined in the Strategy. We used to have five the last time we ran this round, so that's a little bit of a difference. We haven't got rid of anything. We've just combined two of the themes together. So we used to have one in Governance and Economics and Empowering People. 00:04:38:07 - 00:05:06:05 Unknown And that's been, combined into Supporting People in Decisions. These themes, that's like Quantifying hazards and Impacts, Supporting People and Decisions, Resilient Buildings and Smarter Land Use, are key to think about where your proposal might sit in these things, because we'll be doing assessments, initial assessments, based on the research themes. We understand that a lot of research as cross-cutting 00:05:06:05 - 00:05:11:08 Unknown so you'll have to choose a primary research thing. 00:05:11:09 - 00:05:39:04 Unknown Now the criteria, we've got something called the benefit test. This was introduced in the Natural Hazards Insurance Act of 2023. So if you haven't applied for funding with us for a while, this will be something that's a bit new. And you'll see it's quite a big emphasis in the application process. So this is a criteria that is applied to all of our research activities that we fund. 00:05:39:05 - 00:06:02:01 Unknown And it is that the Commission, NHC believes that there's the potential to provide a benefit to insure persons and also can provide the benefit to uninsured as well, but there needs to be benefit to insured persons or to reduce the future cost of providing Natural Hazards Cover. And I'll talk a little bit about what that cover is. 00:06:02:01 - 00:06:36:00 Unknown in a minute. The diagram, the flow diagram on the right kind of walks you through the criteria and the test of these two things and some potential evidence that can be used to support this test or this criteria. So this diagram on the right is, in the Resilience Strategy but this test is explained and both the Resilience Strategy and the Research Strategy. 00:06:36:01 - 00:06:54:04 Unknown So I can't emphasise enough how important it is for your proposal to clearly articulate how it meets this benefit criteria as it sets condition for us to use our funds. 00:06:54:05 - 00:07:24:13 Unknown So just going to touch on what we cover, because that second part is about Natural Hazards Cover. So we cover these perils here earthquake, landslide, volcanic activity, hydrothermal activity, tsunami and fire following those. We also cover storm and flood, but only to land damage, not damage to the home. Sorry, I should mention that, it covers only for residential properties. 00:07:24:13 - 00:07:56:07 Unknown So our levy payers and homeowners who have purchased house insurance that includes fire cover. So, this is an important sort of what we look at when we're looking at doing that benefit test, it is addressing, these various hazards, one or more of these hazards. There's lots more information on what we cover on our website as well. 00:07:56:08 - 00:08:19:14 Unknown So our research funding is kind of made up into four chunks. We have our core funding, which is our investment into research and capability building, which is fairly steady. And this is includes all the contestable rounds, which is the Up the University Research Programme, URPs, which we're talking about today, and also the Biennials, which is another contestable round. 00:08:19:14 - 00:08:47:12 Unknown We fund also includes PhD and by post-doctoral scholarships. We also have a chunk of funding that we set aside for strategic initiatives. These are typically negotiated grants. We might have gone out specifically to commission something for a business need or there's, sort of a strategic, opportunity where we want to invest in something that we think can help. 00:08:47:13 - 00:09:30:08 Unknown And then we have sponsorships where we are supporting knowledge exchange and sharing the knowledge and research between science and practice or policy. And this is, through various, partnerships, sponsorships with professional societies and also conferences. And finally, we have GeoNet, which is this foundational hazard data, which was invested in for over twenty years. So these two contestable rounds that I mentioned as part of our core funding are the Biennial grants, which occur every two years, and the University Research Programmes, which include every three years. And this round is about the University Research Programmes. 00:09:30:09 - 00:10:06:15 Unknown The University Research Programmes tend to be a bit larger. They are programmes of research that is, designed to build capability as well. So through funding students and building that capability base that we need in research as well as delivering to a research programme. So I just take a wee sip of water. 00:10:07:00 - 00:10:38:13 Unknown So firstly I'll introduce you to the team, the people who you might be corresponding with for the round we have Shannon Fraser, who's fairly new to NHC and she is a senior research advisor leading the University Research Programme. We have Janette Merlo who we have welcomed back to give us some extra support for this round, she in particular will be focusing on the technology side of things, helping out with Smarty Grants and Nina Vidovic who is our senior advisor for science communication 00:10:38:13 - 00:11:10:12 Unknown and you might already heard from her with regards to comms about this round, but she will be supporting that as well. So a bit of an overview. We've provided the University Research Programmes since 2020. They had several other forms before that, but things like capability grants, or University Chairs. So since 2020, we've had this new programme called the University Research Programmes. 00:11:10:13 - 00:11:43:14 Unknown It's provided about $9 million for about 18 programmes. So this round for which will start in 2027 on the first of Feb, will be a total of $4.5 million available. Each program is $450,000. And the project length is for three years. So, $150,000 per year, per programme for three years. And so we'll aim to fund about ten programmes. 00:11:43:15 - 00:12:07:12 Unknown All their submissions will be done through Smarty Grants portal. And the programmes are a little bit different this year in that we will only be having one stage, which is to submit a full proposal. The guidelines are all up on the website, and hopefully you've had a chance to look at those. If not, that is your main source of information and guide for the programme. 00:12:07:13 - 00:12:34:02 Unknown So have a good read. Just to give you a high level overview of the process, we opened for the round on the 31st of March and full proposals will be due on the 21st of May. The then there is an eligibility and benefit test, which we will do internally where we check the eligibility of the proposals and how they make the benefit test. 00:12:34:03 - 00:13:08:06 Unknown There's no point in sending full proposals for assessments that don't meet our funding criteria under the Act. Then the proposals will be going to expert assessment panels around June, July, to assess. And those assessment panels are one for each of the research themes. Once the expert assessment panels have scored, reviewed and scored the proposals and met to moderate them 00:13:08:08 - 00:13:49:15 Unknown their commentary, scoring and insights will go to an overarching research advisory committee, which will look across all of the themes to decide which will be the successful proposals. Then there's the final approval by NHC, and notification of the outcome in September. And then finally, hopefully that gives those successful applicants enough time to recruit their students and set up their programmes to start on the 1st of February. 00:13:50:00 - 00:14:18:06 Unknown Some key points regarding eligibility. So, all of these are in the guidelines so I strongly, as well as a few, a few more that we weren't going to cover off today. But really must have a look at those. First of all this is a University Research Programmes. So it's not just universities, but any sort of tertiary education provider that offers both postgraduate study and has a dedicated research function can apply. 00:14:18:10 - 00:14:45:08 Unknown So we've broadened it just slightly this round. Also, we ask that you agree to the research funding agreement template terms and conditions when you apply. So the proposal should be not for research funded elsewhere. So we don't want anything that's kind of duplicated funding. We understand that there is some leveraging that's required 00:14:45:08 - 00:15:23:12 Unknown That's totally fine. We just ask you to be really transparent about that in your applications. Proposals should create a benefit that's accrued outside of the organisation. And, should be conducted in New Zealand. It should produce primarily publicly available research outputs so that we can share them and their benefit. There is a sort of a fixed budget for these, it can't exceed $450,000. 00:15:23:14 - 00:15:50:14 Unknown And that last eligibility criteria is the benefits criteria that I explained earlier. So this is something new for this round as to how we've decided to do the assessment. Partly this is because of some of the feedback from previous rounds where it was quite a lot of work for the panel to assess all of the proposals. 00:15:50:14 - 00:16:22:12 Unknown And also having a broad panel of subject matter experts across a range of disciplines made it quite hard. There was a lot of reliance on some of individual's expertise. So what we've decided this time is to do four smaller panels, one for each of the research themes. So we will post who is in these expert panels once we've confirmed, the panellists. We're just in the process of doing that now. 00:16:22:12 - 00:16:46:15 Unknown So that will be up online in the next few weeks. We will be asking you in your application process to select the theme which best fits your proposal. So think about that quite carefully. We will contact you if we feel that there will be a different panel that would be better suited to assess your proposal. 00:16:46:15 - 00:17:22:11 Unknown But we'll let you know that ahead of time before it is sent to the panel. But just be aware of that and consider which theme best suits your proposal. We'll also have, as I mentioned, our research advisory committee. Their role is to review the scoring and recommendations from the individual expert panels, and then to look across all of the research themes to produce the final recommendations for NHC to then fund and approve. In the process 00:17:22:11 - 00:17:45:14 Unknown you'll also be asked to declare any conflicts of interest. The panellists will also be asked to declare any conflicts of interest as well. So just read the guidelines about what conflict of interest is and whether or not you should declare it. If in doubt, declare it. And we can figure out the best way to manage that. 00:17:45:15 - 00:18:15:06 Unknown If you have any questions, you can always contact reserach@naturalhazards.govt.nz to clear those up. But please look at the guidelines first to see if the answers are in there. As I've mentioned, the assessment panel will be on our website once we've confirmed those panels. Just a few tips on crafting your proposal. 00:18:15:07 - 00:18:42:06 Unknown You can go on to Smarty Grants and download the template of the proposal so that you can start looking at the questions and crafting that offline if you'd like. But the Smarty Grants portal has the ability to save the proposals as well. Just be aware that underneath the question and answer boxes is some additional guidance on how to answer the questions and documents to look at, that sort of thing. 00:18:42:06 - 00:19:11:05 Unknown So do read every question fully. And as well as the guidance. Recommend that you, even though we have these subject matter expert panels, or expert assessment panels I should call them, that are sort of more disciplinary. It's best if you do craft your application for it at an inter-disciplinary audience as some of the areas and panels are still quite broad. 00:19:11:06 - 00:19:33:15 Unknown Key details that we'll be asking in the proposal is a description of the proposed research, how the project fits with the alignment of other research, which are the four themes that most aligns to, how the project will pass the benefit test. I know I keep reiterating this, but it's really important. And what other impacts and benefits they might pick up from the research as well. 00:19:33:15 - 00:20:02:03 Unknown So we have the broader impact not just the benefit test. I won't go into detail about this, it's all in the guidance, but we have a assessment criteria. And so there's a scoring grid that if you've applied to MBIE you will probably be quite familiar with. And that is at the end of that guidance document. Basically it's a 50/50 split between research excellence and impact. 00:20:02:04 - 00:20:18:12 Unknown So just kind of go through that criteria and make sure you're answering it as best as possible. But it's a good thing to look at because that is what the assessment panels will be assessing against. 00:20:18:14 - 00:20:26:02 Unknown So how to apply. 00:20:26:04 - 00:20:54:08 Unknown We use a portal called Smarty Grants. Those who have applied in our contestable rounds will be familiar with it. So if you have applied before you can use your existing log in. If you've applied and forgotten your passwords, you can just press forgot password and go in and change that. Or if you haven't used it before, you can register for a new login. 00:20:54:09 - 00:21:22:02 Unknown You can access Smarty Grants through the apply now link on our website, and I'll pop up the link to it in a minute. So you can either, yourself or your research office, can administer the application. You just have to have shared login details if that's the case. But in that case make sure you do use a unique password. 00:21:22:03 - 00:21:49:05 Unknown Alternatively, the research office can use the Smarty File System in Smarty Grants as well. So starting an application. If you follow that link, you'll go to a page that looks a bit like this where you can start the submission. You can preview the form, download the form to the submission. To start the submission, click Start the submission. 00:21:49:07 - 00:22:12:07 Unknown There's quite a, before you begin explanation down here with links to other documents and guides. Have a good read through that as well. And it also tells you when the closing date is, will be. That will take you to, a login page, or if you've logged in, it will, take you to this page here. 00:22:12:08 - 00:22:35:07 Unknown And this is the form that you can start filling in. There's a navigation on the right. And there's a save progress button here as well. So you can save, log out and come back to it later. That sort of thing. At the end of the form, you'll be asked to review before you submit. 00:22:35:08 - 00:23:00:12 Unknown So to support your application, talk to your research office. They are there to help you. And they'll be best placed to go through the guidance and eligibility and things with you. If you've got any sort of technical issues, you can go directly to Smarty Grants, especially if you've got sort of problems logging in or bugs, those sorts of things, they are usually pretty good at responding. 00:23:00:14 - 00:23:19:15 Unknown And you can also contact the NHC research team at research@naturalhazards.govt.nz, and we are happy to provide you with clarification or additional information if something is not quite clear in the guidance, or if you've got questions there. 00:23:20:01 - 00:23:40:12 Unknown Okay. And with that, we will wrap up our session today. Thank you. There was lots of really great questions, so we'll try and put some of those up on the website. I can think of a few that is definitely worth putting up there that quite a few of you had. So really appreciate your engagement today. 00:23:40:14 - 00:23:50:12 Unknown Coming in, listening to our session. And I really look forward to seeing your proposals coming in on the 21st of May. Good luck everyone, and ka kite.