Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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Question 10: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs the funding for research commissions that have been mediated through the Higher Education Authority to Irish third level institutions. [21832/09]

Liz McManus (Wicklow, Labour)
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Question 73: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs the research that has been initiated or completed under Irish Aid's programme for strategic co-operation with higher education and research institutions launched in December 2006. [21834/09]

Peter Power (Limerick East, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 10 and 73 together.

The programme of strategic co-operation between Irish Aid and higher education and research institutes, launched in 2006, facilitates high quality research to support Irish Aid's poverty reduction mission. The programme is implemented by the Higher Education Authority on behalf of Irish Aid. This includes the administration and monitoring of funding.

To date 15 project awards totalling €12.1 million have been approved for higher education institutions under the programme. Of this amount, €5.9 million has so far been paid from the official development assistance budget to the Higher Education Authority for disbursement to participating institutions.

The programme has established several collaborative research partnerships between higher education institutions in Ireland and Africa since 2007. The nine universities on the island of Ireland, as well as the Dundalk Institute of Technology and the Dublin Institute of Technology, are now working in partnership with a range of higher education institutions in countries in Africa, including Uganda, Tanzania, Mozambique, Lesotho, Sierra Leone, Kenya, Malawi and Ethiopia.

All research undertaken in the programme has a strong focus on the priority areas for the Government's aid programme. These include health, HIV and AIDS, food and livelihood security, education, gender and good governance. Specific research projects initiated under the programme focus on educational assessment and special needs, the strengthening of health systems, gender and HIV and AIDS, sustainable rural development, and conflict resolution. The research projects undertaken under the programme are due be completed between 2011 and 2013. The initial outputs will be assessed in a mid-term evaluation of the programme, which will be carried out next year.

Michael D Higgins (Galway West, Labour)
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When the interim review for these projects, which is due shortly, is completed, will the Minister of State publish details of the receiving institutions and the project leaders? In fairness, I do not mind if the follow-up communications to my questions come to me after today. Has the special unit on governance been established in the Department?

Higher education institutions differ in their research approaches to issues such as land tenure. An institution may adopt a classic neoliberal economic model which is based on the premise of land titles which become collateral for loans which in turn allow land ownership to be restructured. A second model, however, may be based on a social anthropological model which would examine the necessity for land in tribal villages, how migrants are affected and so forth. Is the Minister of State willing to instruct the HEA to ensure all models are considered so as not to have narrow research focus?

I am concerned about the proposed Trinity College Dublin-University College Dublin collaborative research proposals which include research on aid projects as one of their strengths of excellence. It is an excellence that has yet to be demonstrated.

Peter Power (Limerick East, Fianna Fail)
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I will take up the Deputy's offer in forgoing the latter part of his question as it is a separate area for the Department of Education and Science. Regarding special governance units, I refer the Deputy to today's Parliamentary Question No. 12. A team has been established to take account of the linkages between good governance and the other cross-cutting issues in the delivery of the aid programme.

Land tenure is the subject of an entire debate of its own in development circles. Research will be carried out in Ireland and our developing partner countries on a collaborative basis with the intention that land policy results in an effective ability to transfer land from generation to generation, family to family. We also want it to set up an appropriate system to allow smallholder farmers to access microfinance and use their land to its productive best. That is not the case in large areas of the African continent because of the enormous problems with land tenure. I will return to the Deputy in writing about funding particular research projects in that area.