Hong Kong’s major source of academic research funding, the Earmarked Research Grant (ERG), has been approved at HK$505.9 million for 2004-2005.
Of the total, HK$405 million will be distributed through the annual Competitive Earmarked Research Grant (CERG) exercise.
Applications for CERG funding are made by Hong Kong’s eight UGC-funded institutions to the Research Grants Council (RGC).
For the 2004-2005 exercise, competition for funding has been as keen as for the previous year with a total of 1,873 applications received requesting HK$1,720.2 million, about four times the amount of funding available.
The largest number of proposals came from Engineering disciplines (689), followed by Humanities, Social Sciences and Business Studies (484), Biology & Medicine (470), and Physical Sciences (230).
Two other large categories of funding from the ERG are the Direct Allocation of funds to institutions for their discretionary use, and Central Allocation for collaborative research equipment and group research projects.
For 2004-2005, Direct Allocation funding has been set at HK$65 million; and Central Allocation funding at HK$20 million.