Australian Centre for International Research (ACIAR)

Pacific Agriculture Scholarship and Support Program (PASSP)

AIM

The ACIAR Pacific Agriculture Scholarships and Support Program seeks to provide the opportunity for partner country scientists associated with ACIAR-supported projects to obtain postgraduate research qualifications in an applied context within their own cultural settings.

By working in partnership with the University of the South Pacific, Fiji National Universities and affiliated Australian Universities, this scholarship scheme aims to provide Pacific Island students with enhanced learning and skills development outcomes, mentoring, and career developed opportunities, which better position scholarship graduates to gain employment in the national or regional agricultural innovation system.

Background

The Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) is an Australian government authority and forms part of Australia’s international development cooperation program. ACIAR aims to enhance rural household incomes and boarder economic growth by investing in international research partnerships that encourage agricultural development, sustainable use of natural resources and capacity building of benefit to the partner countries and Australia.

ACIAR’s Pacific research program currently operates across eight countries in the Papua New Guinea (PNG) – Pacific region: PNG, Fiji, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, Samoa, Tonga, Kiribati and Tuvalu. ACIAR recognizes that the Pacific Countries have particular research and adoption challenges related to the size of the country, institutional and other capacities, and remoteness from markets. ACIAR’s regional program, and the constituent project portfolio, has been designed to address these.

ACIAR has been providing support for postgraduate research study through the supply of scholarships in agriculture and fisheries at the University of the South Pacific (USP) since 2008.

In 2020, ACIAR has created a more integrated program of scholarship funding and institutional support, and expanded the program to now include the School of Agriculture, Fisheries & Forestry at the Fiji National University (FNU). ACIAR will continue to support the Department of Agriculture, University of Technology, Papua New Guinea, through the academic supervision mentoring.

To read more about the scholarship, click here.