(A) The Exercise

1.	Number of applications received	161
2.	Number of full proposals received	12
3.	Number of proposals recommended for funding	3
4.	Success rate (over the number of applications):	18.8%
5.	Total approved budget of the funded projects:	$266.072 million2
6.	Total funding amount from the RGC	$235.960 million2

¹ Including one application transferred from the Theme-based Research Scheme
² Inclusive of indirect costs / on-costs
 
(B) Selection Panel's Comments for Applicants' Reference

1. Quality of applications (i.e. strengths, weaknesses and gaps of proposals):

• The proposals received in this round of exercise covered a wide range of topics, and the quality was uniformly high. Some of the proposals might have been overly ambitious and broad, containing extensive background information and literature reviews without adequately highlighting the uniqueness of their proposed research and project team. Furthermore,there were also proposals in the field of humanities and social sciences which aimed to tackle social problems relevant to Hong Kong and neighbouring countries. The concerned project teams would benefit from striking a better balance in determining the intellectual and geographical scope of their research, and providing more concrete examples demonstrating how their objectives could be achieved, particularly those with potential social impacts.
• In respect of project teams’ performance during the selection interviews, their presentation had generally impressed the panels. During the question and answer sessions, most research teams could address critical and technical questions through high-level scientific discussions, although there were some did not respond in a direct and succinct manner. Overall, the Panel would like to see more involvement from other team representatives during the interviews, rather than the Project Coordinator making presentation or responding throughout the entire session.

2. Other comments:

• Nil.