Identifying and cultivating sources of funding

1. Richard Adanu Tsiri Agbenyega Identifying and cultivating sources of funding

2. Overview • Types of funded research • The Ghanaian researcher and research funding • Identifying funding sources • Ensuring funding for your research

3. Funding and Research • Personally funded research • Departmental or institutionally funded research • Funded research collaboration • Travel fellowships • Co-PI in a funded research • PI in a funded research

4. Personally funded research • Usually a small study • Personal payment of research assistants • One staff study • Authored paper as output • Highly motivated researcher • Use of research and book allowance

5. Institution funded research • Funds sourced by school or department • Invited to be part of research team • No control over direction or output of research • No assurance of authored publication • Ill defined negotiating ability • Good for building research experience

6. Funded research collaboration • Funds secured by a PI • Recruited as part of research team • Have a defined role • No control over direction or output of research • No assurance of authored publication • Drawback of a paid position • No defined negotiating ability • Good for building research experience

7. Travel fellowships • Funding for activities outside home country • Sabbatical • Conference attendance • Travel scholarship for school • Could be personally funded (high motivation)

8. Co-PI in funded research • Made contribution to proposal for funding • Have a clearly defined role to play • Personal costs • Authorship rights • Rights for access to data • Good for career advancement

9. PI in funded research • Major contribution to identifying source of funding • Major contribution to proposal development • Authorship rights • Rights of access to data • Excellent for career development • Prior research track experience • Not without risks

10. Situation of Ghanaian researcher • Fully paid (underpaid) job • Continuation in position not tied to raising research funds • Continuation in position tied to research output • Need to be able to raise funds • Clarity about issues related to support for time put into research • Competing demands for service provision

11. Information on sources of funds • Read notices • Read newspaper adverts • Read university mail information • Use the internet • From collaborators

12. Getting access to information • Set time aside for processing and acting on freely available information • Get into research collaborations • Work hard and deliver

13. Identifying funding sources • Internet search • Read through output from the internet search • Communication with established researchers

14. Some sources of funding • University of Ghana • Ministry of Health • Ghana AIDS Commission • USAID • DFID • DANIDA • Corporate bodies

15. Other sources of funding • Wellcome Trust • Gates Foundation • Ford Foundation • Hewlett Foundation • World Health Organization • NIH

16. Cultivating sources of funding • Read instructions carefully • Write a good proposal • Respond to reviewer comments • Deliver on your proposal • Publish results • Develop a research profile

17. Funding paradigm “to him who has more, more is given”