Food for the future: Funding nutrition and food security research

≈≈ The only thing I like better than talking about food is eating. — John Walters ≈≈
Does that apply to you or your research? Then you might be interested in hearing about the substantial number of fellowships and funding options available for research on nutrition and food security. Because, yes, the social sciences and humanities also have something to say on those issues!
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The European commission‘s H2020-program has declared food sustainability one of seven « societal challenges » and proposes about a dozen calls for research projects related to food processing, food value chains, food logistics and agriculture (« Societal challenge 2 »). You can find a list and further information on all of those calls on fund┋it.
The calls are currently open until 17th February, however many of them will have a second round until September 2016.
Very soon you will also find on fund┋it some complementary information on the importance of social sciences and humanities in the H2020 calls. Stay up-to-date by bookmarking them in your fund┋it user account!
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But these are not the only international funding options on nutrition and sustainability:
The Thought for Food Initiative, carried out by a conjoint of three European foundations, calls for interdisciplinary project proposals on sustainable food systems. The call for projects is open until 29th February and provided with a generous budget of € 2 million.
Equally, the French branch of the Nestlé foundation offers research grants on the biological, social or human aspects of nutrition. The research projects may be carried out anywhere in the world, however the call is only open to researchers affiliated to a French research institution.
The University of Toronto even hosts a research center entirely devoted to food studies – the Culinaria Research Centre. Applications for its one-year fellowship program are currently open, the proposed research should be focussed on urban food security and activism, or on food experience, discourses and practices.
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Several awards and prices honouring nutrition and food research are also available and currently open for applications.
The Josef G. Knoll European Science Award on Food and Nutrition Security is awarded by Germany based Foundation fiat panis and awards up to € 30.000 to research contributing to the fight against hunger and malnutrition in developing countries.
This year’s Dan David Prize is also dedicated to nutrition and poverty issues. Up to 20 grants of US$ 15.000 are awarded by the homonymous foundation to researchers from Israel and elsewhere.
The Louis Malassis Prize for Agriculture and Food, offered by the Agropolis foundation, is not currently accepting applications – but you can keep an eye on it by bookmarking it in your fund┋it user account.
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Other calls for applications are less specificially dealing with nutrition issues, but do include them as an eligible topic.
Such is the case for the post-doctoral positions currently offered by the French IFRIS institute and the « Art Citoyen » programme by the Carasso foundation, designed to foster artistic and research collaboration between France and Spain.
Last but not least, the Earth Institute at Columbia university runs a postdoctoral fellowship program on global sustainable development, with an important focus on food security. The program is currently closed but – guess what? – you can bookmark it in your fund┋it user account and receive an e-mail notice once it reopens in fall 2016.