The 2017 Sustainable Land Management and Climate Change (SLMACC) research programme funding round is now open.
The Ministry for Primary Industries’ SLMACC research programme supports research in to new climate change knowledge generation in the agriculture and forestry sectors for adaption, mitigation, and cross-cutting issues.
MPI Director General, Martyn Dunne says it’s essential to invest in research to better understand our future operating environment and how we need to adapt.
“This funding plays an important part in helping our primary industries prepare for the future challenges of climate change,” says Mr Dunne.
“We set research priority project topics each funding round based on themes areas we want to investigate further for the benefit of primary industries. We widely consult with internal and external climate change experts to determine those topics.”
“This year we anticipate a high calibre of applications, as is the case every year. The research undertaken provides valuable insights that inform decisions from policy making through to farm management.”
The 2017 funding round will be open from 21 February until 21 April.
Successful applicants can expect to be informed by the middle of June 2017.
At each project's end, reports are made available on the MPI website, the Climate Cloud website, and user friendly summaries will also be made widely available.
Background
Applicants can apply for funding to research the following priority project topics which sit under three themes:
Theme 1: Impacts of climate change and adaptation;
- Project 1.1 Analysis of potential Climate Change impacts on horticulture’s spatial footprint
Theme 2: Mitigation of agricultural and forestry greenhouse gas emissions;
- Project 2.1 Retirement of steep, extremely erosion prone planted forest sites into permanent forest cover and carbon sink.
- Project 2.2 Improve growth models for species other than Pinus radiata and Douglas fir by using Permanent Sample Plot data, MfE LUCAS plot data and ETS field measurement approach data.
- Project 2.3 Best options for land use following Radiata harvesting in the Gisborne district.
- Project 2.4 Evaluation of profitability and future potential for low emission productive uses of land that is currently used for livestock.
Theme 3: Crosscutting issues including information and technology transfer.
- Project 3.1 Develop of community catchment extension groups to manage farm systems at a catchment scale.
- Project 3.2 Understanding the GHG content of NZ’s agrifood exports from sources other than biological GHGs is an important issue as it will become more costly with rising carbon prices, and may increasingly become a point of discernment in future markets.
