Climate change, pandemic recovery, food safety and animal health are the themes of research projects supported by more than $8 million in funding announced today from the University of Guelph’s Food from Thought program.
Under its third and final Thematic Research Fund (Thematic III), the program will provide a total of $8.66 million for projects up to three years in duration led by 23 researchers from U of G and partner universities.
The interdisciplinary projects are intended to develop new insights, contribute solutions to significant agri-food problems, and support Food from Thought’s data management strategy and the development of Agri-food Data Canada (ADC).
The data strategy team is leading the development of ADC, a platform for all agri-food research data at the University of Guelph and a hub for other agri-food nodes, or “data centres,” across Canada.
ADC will offer data management support and access to research computing services and enable the development of research data infrastructure. The project is intended to allow researchers to share and reuse research data and analytics.
The platform will incorporate FAIR data principles to increase data value by making it Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable.
“Congratulations to the grant awardees in this final round of the Food from Thought Thematic Research Fund,” said Dr. Malcolm Campbell, vice president (research).
“These researchers are pushing the frontiers of our knowledge on some of our most pressing agri-food problems. They are leading cutting-edge research to keep the University of Guelph at the forefront of creating innovative solutions to increase the sustainability and productivity of global food production.”.
All proposals were reviewed by multiple external scientific peer reviewers as well as a Food from Thought panel. The assessment focused on the excellence of the research team, its research methods, and the benefit and impact of the proposed research.
Steering committee reviewers also considered each proposal’s fit with Food from Thought objectives and broader agri-food sector priorities, the projects’ contribution to the training and development of University of Guelph graduate students, and the interdisciplinarity of the research.
Food From Thought is a $76.6-million research program at the University of Guelph. The seven-year program, which began in 2016, is funded by the Canada First Research Excellence Fund. Food from Thought aims to make Canada a global leader in developing innovative solutions that improve the sustainability and productivity of agricultural production at global, landscape and micro scales.
Complete list of researchers selected for funding:
Read the research summaries here.
