Details on transfer payment programs

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research is internationally competitive

Canada has a pool of highly skilled people in the social sciences and humanities

The Canada First Research Excellence Fund (CFREF) supports Canada’s postsecondary institutions in their efforts to become global research leaders. CFREF helps institutions: (i) compete with the best in the world for talent, for partnership opportunities and to make breakthrough discoveries; (ii) seize emerging opportunities and strategically advance their greatest strengths on the global stage; and (iii) implement large-scale, transformational and forward-thinking institutional strategies. The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) manages this tri-agency program on behalf of the three federal research funding agencies: the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), and SSHRC.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

• A total of 18 CFREF recipients at 17 Canadian institutions were supported in 2020–21, for a tri-agency investment of $199 million.
• The midterm reviews of 13 CFREFs awarded in the second competition were undertaken during 2020–21. Results are expected by summer 2021. To date, however, the midterm reviews have demonstrated that CFREF recipients have established strong partnerships and collaborations at the national and international levels; recruited highly qualified personnel and students; hired new faculty; built world-class infrastructures; already achieved significant advancements in their respective fields of research; and leveraged funding that will contribute to the sustainability of these initiatives in the long term.
• Funding supports several areas of strategic relevance to Canada, including environment and agriculture; health and related life sciences; advanced manufacturing; information and communications technology; and natural resources and energy.

• Funded grants have largely met immediate outcomes and have demonstrated progress toward achieving intermediate outcomes.
• CFREF continues to be relevant as it provides the government with a unique vehicle for strategically investing in priority research areas.
• The CFREF program is well aligned with government priorities on innovation and talent recruitment.
• CFREF participants identified access to interdisciplinary research and training environments and access to state-of-the-art research facilities as key benefits of participation in grant-funded activities.
• While institutions are working to implement their equity, diversity and inclusion (EDI) plans, this work needs to continue in order to improve representation and diversity among CFREF teams.
• The flexibility that CFREF offers grantees to build their own governance structure was identified as a strength of the program by many key informants.
• Securing funding to sustain transformational changes brought by a CFREF grant could be a challenge following the end of the granting period.
• The CFREF program has been delivered by the Tri-agency Institutional Programs Secretariat (TIPS) in a very cost-efficient manner to date.
• Grantees and applicants identified some challenges, which could be mitigated by improving communications between TIPS and grantees/applicants.
• Reporting activities could be improved to enhance consistency in data collection, and to better capture long-term outcomes and contributions of these grants. Specific areas for improvement were identified in the final report.

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research is internationally competitive

Canada has a pool of highly skilled people in the social sciences and humanities

SSHRC’s portion of the Canada Graduate Scholarships program provides financial support to high-calibre scholars who are engaged in master’s or doctoral programs in the social sciences and humanities. This tri-agency program is administered by each respective agency: CIHR, NSERC and SSHRC.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

The Canada Graduate Scholarships program strives to make Canada one of the world’s top countries for research training and development in order to build an innovative and competitive economy, increase future job opportunities, and, ultimately, generate social, economic and cultural benefits for Canadians. As a result of Budget 2019 investments in the Canada Graduate Scholarships program, additional awards (500 master’s and 167 doctoral) were offered. After this funding was fully ramped up in 2021, Canada Graduate Scholarships offered a total of 3,000 master’s and 3,000 doctoral scholarships (over three years) across all three granting agencies.

In 2020–21, SSHRC invested $77 million in Canada Graduate Scholarships to support research training in the social sciences and humanities.

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research is internationally competitive

Canada has a pool of diverse and highly skilled people in the social sciences and humanities

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research knowledge is used

The Canada Research Continuity Emergency Fund aims to help mitigate impacts of the pandemic on the government’s overall expected outcomes for the academic research enterprise by: maintaining or restoring Canada’s international competitiveness in the global, knowledge-based economy; and contributing to Canadians’ health and their social and cultural life, as well as the health of Canada’s natural environment.

This temporary program was established to help sustain the research enterprise at Canadian universities and health research institutions that have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The program is expected to help reduce negative impacts of the pandemic and ensure that the benefits of significant investments to date in universities and health research institutions are protected. SSHRC manages this tri-agency program on behalf of CIHR, NSERC and SSHRC. The Canada Research Coordinating Committee provides strategic oversight for the program and approves awards.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

The Canada Research Continuity Emergency Fund was launched in June 2020 and ended at the end of March 2021. The program’s initial budget was $450 million. As of March 2021, 64 institutions and their 61 affiliated health research institutions, as well as one non-affiliated health research institution, had benefited from $434 million awarded by the program.

Through the Canada Research Continuity Emergency Fund, the Government of Canada helped support close to 32,000 research-related personnel at universities and health research institutions whose salaries were adversely affected by COVID-19. Additionally, more than 22,000 research projects received help to cover costs for unanticipated maintenance and ramp-up activities that would not normally have been incurred if it weren’t for the pandemic.

As an eligibility requirement, universities and health research institutions had to meet the program’s EDI requirements.

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research is internationally competitive

Canada has a pool of highly skilled people in the social sciences and humanities

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research knowledge is used

Insight Research

Research Training and Talent Development

Research Partnerships

This transfer payment program consists of grants and scholarships awarded for research, talent development and research dissemination activities in the social sciences and humanities.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

SSHRC’s Grants and Scholarships program supported over 28,900 students and researchers for a total investment of $359 million.

An important goal of SSHRC’s Grants and Scholarships program is to support students and postdoctoral researchers (collectively referred to as “research trainees”) in order to develop society’s next generation of researchers and leaders, both within academia and across the public, private and not-for-profit sectors. In 2020–21, SSHRC supported 3,050 students and postdoctoral fellows through scholarships and fellowships. Collectively, researchers that submitted an end of grant report in 2020–21 reported that 3,838 research trainees had been supported through their grants.

SSHRC funded over 5,300 new grants and awards through its Grants and Scholarships program in 2020–21.

In 2020–21, the amount of funding leveraged from partners on SSHRC-funded research projects exceeded $67 million.

• Canadian journals have served as a publication channel for a majority of Canadian social sciences and humanities researchers and are important channels for publication. SSHRC’s other investments in Canadian research and researchers are augmented by funding to journals.
• ASJ funding enables a significant and meaningful increase in the amount of social sciences and humanities research published each year. ASJ makes small, indirect contributions in some other areas.
• The data for ASJ indicate that ASJ is cost-efficient.
• ASJ is an important component of SSHRC’s effort to increase quality open access capacity in Canada.
• ASJ’s objectives are under-conceptualized. ASJ’s current logic model does not accurately capture ASJ’s performance nor the mechanisms by which it contributes to outcomes.
• The current investment in ASJ is not sufficient to produce more than a very modest contribution to the amount, quality and accessibility/discoverability of published Canadian research.

An evaluation of Awards to Scholarly Publications (ASP) completed in February 2021 presented these key findings:

• ASP is relevant to social sciences and humanities researchers. However, its relevance is highly concentrated in specific areas of social sciences and humanities. ASP is also highly relevant to Canadian scholarly publishers and makes an important contribution to a subset of university presses. Alignment is evident between ASP and specific SSHRC priorities.
• ASP is achieving its primary intended objective to support research dissemination. ASP’s support enables scholarly publishers to invest in manuscripts of high scholarly value but low cost-recovery potential.
• ASP’s cost-efficiency ratio is high because of its funding delivery mechanism, which draws substantially on SSHRC resources.
• The funding fills a niche not addressed by other funding; however, ASP’s objectives are broad and ambitious for its small size and the concentrated relevance of the funding for social sciences and humanities research.

Planning for the evaluation of the Canada Research Chairs was under way but was delayed by pandemic-related isolation; it will likely be completed by September 2022.

The evaluation of Research Training and Talent Development was under way and is scheduled to be completed in October 2022.

The Banting Postdoctoral Fellowships evaluation is under way. This evaluation is being led by CIHR, with an expected completion date of June 2022.

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research is internationally competitive

Canada has a pool of highly skilled people in the social sciences and humanities

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research knowledge is used

The Networks of Centres of Excellence program supports large-scale academically led research networks that harness the creativity and inventiveness of Canadian health, natural and social scientists, and engineers. Partners from industry, government and not-for-profit organizations contribute additional expertise, and bring cash and in-kind support. NSERC manages this tri-agency program on behalf of CIHR, NSERC and SSHRC.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research is internationally competitive

Canada has a pool of highly skilled people in the social sciences and humanities

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research knowledge is used

The New Frontiers in Research Fund (NFRF) transfer payment program supports research that is international, interdisciplinary, fast-breaking and high risk / high reward. The NFRF supports projects not easily supported through existing tri-agency and agency-specific mechanisms, and it contributes to enhancing Canada’s competitiveness in the global, knowledge-based economy.

SSHRC manages this tri-agency program on behalf of CIHR, NSERC and SSHRC.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

Grants to researchers from the NFRF Exploration stream equalled $42 million in 2020–21 to support high risk, high reward and interdisciplinary research. Top-ups and one-year extensions were given to all 2018 and 2019 grantees, in recognition of the hardship created by the COVID-19 pandemic. The definition of early career researcher was also extended in recognition of the pandemic’s impact. Of over 600 applications submitted to the 2020 Exploration competition, 117 projects received awards, 35% of these were led by early career researchers, and 68% were awarded to teams where at least half of the team were individuals from underrepresented groups: women, members of Indigenous peoples, visible minorities or persons with disabilities.

The inaugural competition of the NFRF Transformation stream was ongoing in 2020–21. The objective of this stream is to build strength and leadership in interdisciplinary and transformative research. The competition will be finalized in August 2021, with at least six grants being awarded. The letter of intent deadline for the 2020 Transformation competition was extended due to disruptions caused by the pandemic, and subsequent adjustments were made to the competition timeline.

The 2020 Horizon Global Platform competition was launched in January 2020. This funding opportunity aims to enhance opportunities for Canadian researchers to participate in research with international partners. As of March 31, 2021, two have been awarded grants (after providing proof of funding from Horizon 2020), while a remaining 10 grants were conditionally awarded.

The Research Support Fund (RSF) transfer payment program supports a portion of the indirect costs associated with the conduct of academic research in institutions that receive research grant funds from any of the three federal research granting agencies. Grants are awarded to eligible institutions using a progressive funding formula based on the average revenues from research grants received from CIHR, NSERC and SSHRC. SSHRC manages this tri-agency program on behalf of CIHR, NSERC, and SSHRC.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

• The total investment of the RSF, including the Incremental Project Grants stream, for 2020–21 was $414.6 million.
• The RSF supported 155 institutions through the base program allocation for a total investment of $369 million.
• An investment of $45.6 million supported 31 institutions through Incremental Project Grants. This stream provides additional support to eligible institutions for the indirect costs of research, by funding proposed projects that focus on a set of priorities that cut across the RSF’s five existing categories of eligible expenses: research facilities; research resources; management and administration of the research enterprise; regulatory requirements and accreditation; and intellectual property and knowledge mobilization.
• The largest proportion of investment went toward research facilities (33%, $136.8 million), followed by management and administration (31%, $128.5 million), research resources (22%, $91.2 million), regulatory requirements and accreditation (8%, $33.2 million), and intellectual property and knowledge mobilization (6%, $24.9 million).

• Federal investments in direct research funding continue to generate indirect costs at institutions.
• The increased federal investments have been mirrored by increases in RSF funds.
• Institutions appreciate the flexibility of the RSF, allowing them to respond to local cost drivers. There continues to be a need for a federal contribution that defrays these costs. The RSF has defrayed indirect costs in the five eligible expenditure categories (immediate outcomes).
• The RSF has made a contribution toward intermediate outcomes. The strength of the causality between the program’s immediate and intermediate outcomes have been overemphasized in the program’s logic model.
• Examples from institutions explained how the investments made in the expenditure areas contributed to the RSF’s intermediate outcomes. Institutions’ perceived impact of the RSF was generally high.
• The contributions could not be systematically quantified. A contribution toward effective use of federal funding was inferred (final outcomes). The RSF has a low operating ratio, which has decreased over time. However, some concerns were raised regarding the sufficiency of resources for program administration and the efficiency of the process used to calculate grant amounts, which resides at each of the three agencies.

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research is internationally competitive

Canada has a pool of highly skilled people in the social sciences and humanities

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research knowledge is used

The Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarships program is a tri-agency program designed to attract and retain world-class doctoral students by offering them a significant financial award. This financial award assists students during their studies at Canadian universities. Vanier scholars demonstrate leadership skills and a high standard of scholarly achievement in the social sciences and humanities, natural sciences and engineering, and health-related fields. CIHR manages this tri-agency program on behalf of CIHR, NSERC and SSHRC.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

• In the 2020–21 competition, SSHRC committed an investment of $8.25 million over three years to support research training in areas related to the social sciences and humanities.

• There is a continued need to support both national and international top-tier doctoral students in Canadian institutions.
• The program’s objectives are aligned with the legislation and priorities of the federal granting agencies.
• The current design and delivery of the program (e.g., the quota and nomination model) limits its ability to attract top students from other countries to Canada and retain Canada’s top doctoral students at the time of application.
• Almost all international students were already living in Canada at the time of application.
• The majority of recipients were already enrolled in a doctoral program in Canada or would have enrolled in the same doctoral program had they not received the award.
• The assessment of leadership is a challenge due to subjectivity in the interpretation of and inconsistency in the leadership criteria (more so for international applications).
• The program is achieving its expected intermediate outcomes; however, applicants (those who did not receive the award) and recipients report very similar outcomes, which calls into question the added value of the program.
• The majority of both award recipients and applicants are living and working in Canada after graduation, working in the academic sector, working in research-intensive careers, and reporting similar outcomes in terms of leadership opportunities.
• However, award recipients have higher research productivity than applicants following completion of their doctoral degrees and are more likely to be in more advanced academic positions.

The Business-Led Networks of Centres of Excellence program funds large-scale collaborative research networks that bring a wide range of research expertise to bear on specific challenges identified by an industrial sector. NSERC manages this tri-agency program on behalf of SSHRC, CIHR and NSERC.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

Private sector investments in Canadian research are increased.

Training of skilled researchers is supported.

Transfer of ideas from the laboratory into solutions needed by the private sector is accelerated.

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research is internationally competitive

Canada has a pool of highly skilled people in the social sciences and humanities

The Canada 150 Research Chairs Program provides Canadian universities with a one-time investment to attract top-tier, internationally based scholars and researchers (including Canadian expatriates) to Canada. SSHRC manages this tri-agency program on behalf of CIHR, NSERC and SSHRC.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

• In 2020–21, the program’s total investment was $14.3 million. The program supports 24 Canada 150 Research Chairs, including six (25%) that align with SSHRC’s mandate.
• Of the 24 chairholders, about 60% are women and 42% are Canadian researchers choosing to return to Canada to carry out their ambitious research programs. Each chairholder has the opportunity to recruit students from Canada and beyond who will help further their work in disciplines such as chemistry, microbiology, evolutionary genomics, gender and African politics, global governance, neurosciences, epigenetics, public health and psychology.

• Canada Excellence Research Chairs and Canada 150 Research Chairs are unique in their ability to attract and support world-class international researchers in building research capacity within Canada. These programs represent a specific niche in federal funding programs.
• The two programs have been successful in attracting world-class researchers to Canada. In turn, the reputation and innovative research of these chairholders has been cited as a main factor in attracting faculty and highly qualified personnel to core teams, and the forming of partnerships and collaborations.
• The primary issue with the Canada 150 Research Chairs competition was that its timeline was too compressed, which ultimately resulted in candidates declining the potential nomination.
• Despite advances over the last few years, there are still a number of EDI implementation challenges, which in part pertain to the lack of clarity around EDI requirements and what recruitment targets should be applied.

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research is internationally competitive

Canada has a pool of highly skilled people in the social sciences and humanities

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research knowledge is used

The Canada Excellence Research Chairs program is a tri-agency initiative that supports Canadian universities in their efforts to build on Canada’s growing reputation as a global leader in research and innovation. The program awards funding to world-renowned researchers and their teams to establish ambitious research programs at Canadian universities. SSHRC manages this tri-agency program on behalf of CIHR, NSERC and SSHRC.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

• In 2020–21, the program supported 17 Canada Excellence Research Chairs with a total budget of $22.7 million, including two that align with SSHRC’s mandate.
• A midterm review process for all Canada Excellence Research Chairs awarded as of 2013 is under way and will be completed in 2021. The review process has demonstrated to date that chairholders are building competitive research environments that are attracting top talent and building a critical mass of expertise in the country’s priority areas.
• Women represent 41.1% of chairholders under the program, the highest representation of women in its history.

• Canada Excellence Research Chairs and Canada 150 Research Chairs are unique in their ability to attract and support world-class international researchers in building research capacity within Canada. These programs represent a specific niche in federal funding programs.
• The two programs have been successful in attracting world-class researchers to Canada. In turn, the reputation and innovative research of these chairholders has been cited as a main factor in attracting faculty and highly qualified personnel to core teams, and the forming of partnerships and collaborations.
• Qualitative data suggest that the Canada Excellence Research Chairs program has resulted in increased research capacity at host institutions and has greatly influenced the career trajectories of team members, thus contributing to a range of successes that extend beyond the accomplishments of the chairholder alone.
• Canada Excellence Research Chairs might not be reaching wider audiences beyond academia—counter to an expected intermediate outcome under the program’s logic model.
• The timeframe for the program’s application and nomination process was considered too lengthy and onerous, which ultimately led to the loss of desirable candidates. Other concerns included the length of the Canada Excellence Research Chairs term, that is, the number of years available to spend the $10 million award.
• Despite advances over the last few years, there are still a number of EDI implementation challenges, which in part pertain to the lack of clarity around EDI requirements and what recruitment targets should be applied.

The Centres of Excellence for Commercialization and Research program bridges the challenging gap between innovation and commercialization. The program matches clusters of research expertise with the business community to share the knowledge and resources that bring innovations to market faster. Centres advance research and facilitate commercialization within four priority areas: the environment; natural resources and energy; health and life sciences; and information and communications technologies. NSERC manages this program on behalf of CIHR, NSERC and SSHRC.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

• Pre-competitive development of promising technology and the promotion of its transfer to new or established Canadian companies are facilitated

The College and Community Innovation Program is managed by NSERC in collaboration with CIHR and SSHRC. The program increases innovation at the community and/or regional level by enabling Canadian colleges to increase their capacity to work with local companies, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises, in areas of the natural and social sciences, engineering, the humanities and/or health. It supports applied research and collaboration that facilitate commercialization, as well as technology transfer, adaptation and adoption of new technologies, in areas of strategic importance to Canada.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

• In 2020–21, the College and Community Innovation Program continued to simplify, streamline and address the changing dynamics of applied research in colleges and communities across Canada. This evolution will better reflect the program’s tri-agency nature by broadening the program’s scope to include social and health innovation.

Canada has a pool of highly skilled people in the social sciences and humanities

Canada’s social sciences and humanities research knowledge is used

Mobilizing Insights in Defence and Security (MINDS) is a Department of National Defence (DND) initiative, part of which is managed by SSHRC on behalf of DND. The objective of the MINDS initiative is to strengthen the Canadian knowledge base in contemporary defence and security issues through supporting research training and fostering capacity-building in defence and security-related areas across disciplines.

SSHRC is responsible for providing this financial support on behalf of DND to students at the master’s and doctoral level and to postdoctoral fellows who are pursuing research related to defence and security, thereby helping to foster the next generation of defence and security experts.

This transfer payment program does not have repayable contributions.

DND partnered with SSHRC to deliver the MINDS Scholarship Initiative. The MINDS program is committed to fostering the next generation of security and defence scholars in the Canadian academic community and to encouraging a strong Canadian knowledge base in contemporary defence and security issues by supporting research in areas related to one or more of the MINDS Policy Challenges and/or Canada’s defence policy Strong, Secure, Engaged.

In 2020–21, the MINDS Scholarship Initiative supported 28 new and two ongoing students/researchers at the master’s, doctoral and postdoctoral levels through four streams of funding:

• nine MINDS Master’s Scholarships for Indigenous Students
• six MINDS Initiative Doctoral Awards
• one MINDS Initiative Postdoctoral Fellowship
• 12 MINDS Scholarship Initiative Supplements