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There is no room for complacency .
Gender gap
NHMRC vows gender equality in grant funding .
By Emilie Lauer
From 2023 , the NHMRC will attribute equal numbers of funding grants to women , non-binary researchers and men , in order to address ‘ systemic ’ gender inequities .
The new initiative was announced by health minister Mark Butler , and will see the National Health and Medical Research Council introduce new measures under the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 to address disadvantage faced by female and nonbinary grant applicants .
Butler said setting targets had been proven as an efficient way to counter gender inequities in grant funding at a junior level but had not yet been tested at a senior level .
“ The structural barriers that prevent women from contributing fully and advancing careers in medical research are many ,” he said .
“ A 50:50 funding target for senior researchers will directly tackle this loss of talent and give more women the opportunity to take their research forward for the benefit of us all .”
The NHMRC will provide an equal number of leadership grants for women , non-binary and men in the Investigator
Anne Kelso welcomed the announcement to better foster gender diversity in senior health and medical research . Picture : Kym Smith / News Corp Australia .
Grant scheme , its largest funding scheme and investment in Australia ’ s health and medical research workforce .
Non-binary researchers will be explicitly included in the NHMRC funding scheme alongside women for the first time .
At the Emerging Leadership levels ( EL1 and EL2 ) non-binary lead investigators will now be eligible for structural priority funding along female lead investigators .
For the Leadership category ( L1 , L2 , L3 combined ), a spokesperson told Campus Review the NHMRC will adopt a new intervention to achieve equal numbers of grants by gender .
NHMRC will create two separate ranked lists in the leadership category , a male list and a female and non-binary list .
Funds will be allocated from the top of each list with a target to award equal numbers of grants .
The decision to introduce the new measures comes after the review of the previous grants attribution which showed that in three years , male applicants received about 35 per cent more grants and 67 per cent more total funding - about $ 95 million extra per year than women applicants .
“ Existing gender equity initiatives are working but progress is slow ,” a NHMRC spokesperson told Campus Review .
“ The pandemic has exacerbated the insecure employment of many researchers , especially women , who are more likely to be on short-term contracts and we are already seeing their publication rates reduced .
“ We cannot afford to continue wasting a large part of our talent pool in health and medical research if we are to maintain and improve the health of our community .”
Adjunct Research Fellow at the University of Western Australia Medical School Kathryn Ramsey has welcomed the announcement .
The researcher and mother of two said she believes the new funding scheme will allow her to reach a leadership position when the time comes .
“ Once you enter this mid-career phase and start having a family , you have career disruptions and long periods of time for maternity leave and it can be difficult to have the confidence to balance it all ,” Ramsey told Campus Review .
“ Having the same number of grants funded by women in these leadership levels actually gives you hope that maybe it ’ s achievable , that maybe it ’ s worth your time as applying and submitting for these grants is a lot of work .
“ I thought I was reaching the end . Maybe the leadership levels are now a possibility ,” she said .
The Investigator Grant scheme is NHMRC ’ s largest scheme awarding around $ 370 million funding in health and medical research each year .
The grants provide a 5-year fellowship and research support for researchers at all career stages .
This year , the scheme funded 225 projects for $ 375 million , with UNSW claiming 36 grants for more than $ 64.6 million .
UNSW deputy vice-chancellor of research professor Nicholas Fisk said he was pleased to see twice as many women as men at UNSW being successful .
” In response to the concerning gender imbalance that has beset this scheme in both submissions and awards , UNSW recently upscaled its institutional and individual support for women investigators , in particular encouraging researchers who may not have otherwise applied , to step up ,” he said .
“ Of course , this is only one round , and there is no room for complacency .”. ■
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