Envirolink Update - 28 June 2024
MBIE has confirmed that Envirolink will continue from 1 July 2024 with a budget of $1.8M (ex GST). This will be nominally allocated as $1.3M for advice grants and $0.5M for Tool Grants. As usual the Tool Grant round will close early October. The Governance Committee tries to ensure even allocation across the eligible councils.
New "stories" about Envirolink projects have been added on this page. New reports have also been posted. https://envirolink.govt.nz/envirolink-reports/
Last year's (2023) Tool Round applications closed on 9 October 2023 and proposals were reviewed by the Tool Committee on 19 October. Recommendations from the Tool Committee were reviewed by the Governance Committee in mid-November. Recommendations for full proposal development were sent to MBIE in early December and approved by MBIE in late February. Contracts are expected to be issued for the new tool projects by 1 July 2024.
A Summer 2023 newsletter covering Envirolink reports is available here. A winter 2024 newsletter is under development.
Interesting webinar - Envirolink-funded project on progress and considerations using eDNA technology - check out eDNA_webinar_3October2022.mp4
In 2019 MBIE published an independent review of Envirolink. The report is available at:
https://www.mbie.govt.nz/assets/envirolink-evaluation-report-2019.pdf
As a result of the review the maximum funding for all advice grant categories was doubled, but the total amount of funds available remained the same. MBIE is currently working with the Envirolink Coordinator to reduce administration costs to streamline the advice grant process.
New Stories
"New stories", short snippets on some of the Envirolink projects can be found on the News & Events page. New stories will be added as they are developed.
New reports and tools are available on this website (under Reports).
Regional Council Revised RS&T Strategy 2020
The Regional Council RS&T Strategy (third version released in June 2016) has been updated and is with the publishers. The strategy takes both a top-down and a bottom-up approach as it contains input from 9 Special Interest Group strategies. Previous versions of the strategy have been invaluable in providing direction to the MBIE contestable funding round that closed mid March. It has also been used to provide input to the DoC/MfE Conservation and Environment Science Roadmap, to Biosecurity 2025, and to other MPI initiatives. In 2022 it is being used to feed into the MfE-led Environment and Climate Science Research strategy.
(Go to Strategy)
Last updated 25 June 2024.