The Private Enterprise in Low-Income Countries (PEDL) program invites proposals for the 3rd Special Exploratory Research Grant on projects aimed at understanding the role of firms in addressing climatic and environmental challenges.

Lower-income countries face a dual crisis of climate and environmental degradation. South Asian and Sub-Saharan African countries are among the most vulnerable to climate change.

Since the private sector is central to addressing both climate and environmental crises, the Exploratory Research Grant program seeks to seed new research agendas that might lead to more extensive projects as they develop.

The Private Enterprise in Low-Income Countries (PEDL) supports this scaling through Major Research Grants (MRGs), and through a Scale-up Grant program that aims to bridge the gap between the initial work of an Exploratory Research Grant and a full-scale project.

PEDL particularly encourages proposals related to adaptation and resilience in the face of climate change, and projects on mitigating pollution and improving local environmental conditions. It also welcomes proposals on climate change mitigation, particularly proposals that provide evidence on the costs and benefits of mitigation to firms in PEDL-focus countries.

Proposals responding to this call should make clear how the research addresses firms. Projects may examine the role of firms as individual entities or the interaction of firms within markets. PEDL does not focus on agriculture, although we are open to projects exploring firm-farm interactions through input and output markets.

Depending on the final allocation of research budgets for the UK’s 2023 fiscal year, PEDL presently expects to have, at least, one MRG call in 2022, and another in 2023. It, therefore, encourages ambition in the proposals, even if this call only allows for pilots or other initial steps in developing the agenda.

In the interest of clarity and to stimulate thinking, we list below several topics and examples of research topics. This list is not meant to be exhaustive and we invite proposals for research in PEDL-priority countries in any area on the role of the private sector in addressing issues related to climate change and the environment.

Topic areas and sample research topics:

Energy

The private sector plays a role in developing a reliable electric grid necessary to meet the growing demand of firms and households. There is an interaction between investment and regulatory policy, especially as the latter relates to long-term power purchase contracts.

• How can renewables and storage support the development of reliable electricity grids?
• What are the sources of regulatory and investment risk for private sector investment in renewables, and how can these be mitigated?

Transport

Adoption of electric vehicles is increasing in high-income countries, and investment in electric motorcycles and three-wheelers in increasing Africa and South Asia. But electric mobility is only one aspect of transport. Mass transits systems and streamlining transport logistics are also very active areas in PEDL-focus countries.

• What are the challenges and benefits of the adoption of electric transport?
• What is the role of the private sector in mass transit?
• What are the constraints to increasing the efficiency of transport of goods?

Industrial Production

Energy use in industrial processes contributes around one-quarter of CO2 emission globally. From a development perspective, the effect of industrial production on air quality is at least as important. Brick kilns alone are estimated to be responsible for as much as 58% of PM2.5 in Dkaka in the dry season.

• What is the role of innovation and technology adoption in reducing emissions of both PM 2.5 and GHGs?
• How can policy interact with the private sector to achieve results?
• What determines the uptake of energy-saving innovations by private sector firms?

Trade

GHG emissions of producers of exported goods may be thought of as induced by the final consumers of those goods. Tariffs in both producing and consuming markets may skew the prices of carbon-intensive and non-intensive goods.

• How do import policies impact production decisions and technology adoption?
• How are climate mitigation demands of consumers in higher-income countries transmitted through buyers to producers in lower-income countries?

Markets for risk

Insurance is an important factor in resilience at the level of the farmer or firm. Insurance may also be necessary to encourage investment in capital-intensive sectors like grid-scale renewables.

• How are the effects of climate change distributed across firms of different sizes, sectors, and locations?
• What innovations are required in local insurance markets to mitigate the increased risks arising from climate change?
• In the absence of full insurance markets, what are the adaption strategies of firms in PEDL-focus countries?

Innovation

Innovation will play a major role in the resolution of either of these crises.

• What are the constraints to the adoption of climate-friendly technologies, be they internal (e.g., management) or external (e.g., finance, market prices) to the firm?
• Is green tech imported or produced domestically?

Grant Set-up:

Exploratory Research Grant Program projects typically run for 12 months.

Please note that contracts should be signed within one month of the outcome notification, which is also the expected start date for the projects.

The Exploratory Research Grant is designed to be contracted directly with individual researchers. The individual researcher will be responsible for receiving, spending, and reporting on funds. There should be no institutional involvement. In exceptional circumstances and with significant justification contracts can be drafted with the individual’s institution, but these are non-negotiable and the institution cannot take any overhead fees.

The budget limit for ERGs is £40,000. These grants will fund research assistance, data collection and new surveys in LICs, and (if necessary) teaching buyouts for the principal investigator. Please note that cost-effectiveness and value for money are important evaluation criteria and costs considered to be unreasonable may result in a lower proposal rating. Please refer to the Exploratory Research Grants budget guidelines for further guidance on research stipends.

For further information on Exploratory Research Grant, please consult the FAQs.

Country Criteria:

Please note that an important criterion for funding proposals is the relevance to policy in LICs and other eligible countries as defined by the PEDL Programme. See the list of LICs and FCDO focus countries here.

Proposals for projects outside the focus countries should make a clear case for the relevance of the research to policy in lower-income countries, and also justify why the research is feasible only in non-target countries.

Note that PEDL is currently unable to fund projects located in Myanmar and Palestine.

COVID-19:

Given the ongoing and varied impacts of COVID-19, it is expected that proposals involving face-to-face interaction will clearly explain their planned safety measures and contingency plans in the proposal.

PEDL encourages proposals that make use of existing administrative data or collect information through other means such as phone surveys so long as this is feasible and won’t diminish the quality of the data collected.

If you have questions on this, please contact the PEDL team at [email protected].

The required special proposal forms and budget guidelines are found at the bottom of this page. The deadline for proposals is 23:59 GMT, 31 March 2022.

Application Resources:

For information on pre-application, application templates, etc., click here.

Applications close 23:59 GMT, 31 March 2022.