Federal Research Support Fund

The Federal Research Support Fund (RSF), provided by the Government of Canada, assists Canadian postsecondary institutions with the costs associated with managing their research enterprise, helping them to maintain a world-class research environment.

When people think about the cost of research, for many what comes to mind are things like specialized equipment, salaries of trainees (graduate students, post-doctoral fellows and research assistants), travel costs, and so forth. These are the “direct” costs of research – budgeted expenditures for undertaking a specific research project. Less likely to be associated with the costs of research, however, are things like maintenance of the building where the researcher works, the electricity used to power the specialized equipment, or the staff that provide support for research funding applications/agreements, oversight and compliance. These “indirect” costs are the hidden costs of research; the real dollars incurred by the University, or affiliated institutions, to support research activities. It can be difficult to assign these costs to specific projects since these necessities for conducting research are often shared. U of T has established a Research Administration Policy that provides a more specific definition of “direct” and “indirect” costs.

The RSF program provides partial support to universities and their affiliates for the indirect costs of research associated with eligible Tri-Agency (i.e., NSERC, SSHRC, CIHR) awards. This funding helps institutions to address hidden costs of research such as lighting, heating, and the increasingly complex oversight and compliance requirements that ensure the safety of researchers, as well as their human and animal subjects. This support allows researchers to concentrate on conducting cutting-edge research.

According to its website, the Research Support Fund assists Canadian postsecondary institutions with the costs associated with managing their research enterprise, helping them to maintain a world-class research environment. Grants can be used to do any of the following.

• Maintain modern labs and equipment
• Provide access to up-to-date knowledge resources
• Provide research management and administrative support
• Meet regulatory and ethical standards
• Transfer knowledge from academia to the private, public and not-for-profit sectors, and, in so doing, helps to make Canada a world leader in research and development

The University of Toronto is a large, complex institution, comprising three campuses, 18 Faculties/Divisions, 90 Departments, and 179 extra departmental units. The University of Toronto also includes the following 14 affiliated hospitals, and each receives a portion of our RSF funds.

• Baycrest Health Sciences
• Centre for Addiction and Mental Health
• Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital
• Hospital for Sick Children
• Humber River Hospital
• Michael Garron Hospital (Toronto East Health Network)
• North York General Hospital
• Scarborough Health Network
• Sinai Health System (Mount Sinai Hospital)
• Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre
• Trillium Health Partners
• Unity Health Toronto
• University Health Network
• Women's College Hospital
   

See the comprehensive list of all affiliated institutions (including primary, sub- and sub-sub-affiliates).

For 2024-25, the University and its affiliates have notionally received a total grant of $65,571,879, consisting of the following.

• Research Support Fund - $44,681,199
• Incremental Project Grant - $10,747,517
• Research Security - $4,143,163
   

The projected allocations for RSF expense categories reflect the actual proportions in the most recent year for which financial reporting is complete. Therefore, the 2024-25 projection is based on RSF reporting for 2022-23. The 2022-23 reporting aggregates expenditure totals by federal indirect cost category across the University and its affiliates (as noted in the graph below).

Each year, the University’s Planning and Budget Office undertakes a detailed analysis of the institutional costs associated with supporting the University’s research enterprise. Although the RSF provides critical indirect costs support for research funded through selected tri-agency programs, a significant gap remains between the true indirect cost of tri-agency funded research relative to direct costs. Our actual on campus indirect cost level was 61.7% in 2023-24. The rate provided through the RSF program in 2023-24 was 19.2% when including IPG and the Research Security Fund, the lowest rate of any university in Canada. The resulting gap (42.5%) constrains our potential as an internationally competitive research institution and requires the redirection of funds to indirect costs of research from other operations, including our teaching function.

Annual University of Toronto Research Support Fund – Grant Amounts & Expenditures by Category

The RSF provides funding to Canadian postsecondary institutions to assist with the management of their research enterprise. RSF funds are allocated to five eligible expenditure categories, which include the following.

• Research facilities
• Research resources
• Management and administration of research enterprise
• Regulatory requirements and accreditation
• Intellectual property & knowledge mobilization
   

The RSF program requires eligible institutions to prepare institutional performance indicators for the upcoming year.

• U of T RSF 2024-25 Institutional Performance Objectives
   

Additionally, the University is also responsible for reporting outcomes on a yearly basis. Please see U of T’s 2022-23 Research Support Fund – Institutional Performance Objectives.

The Incremental Project Grants (IPG) was introduced in 2018-2019 to provide eligible institutions with additional support for projects that focus on the following four IPG priority areas.

• Innovation and commercialization activities
• Facilities renewal, including deferred maintenance
• Information resources, including digital resources, open access and databases
• Equity, diversity and faculty renewal (in the context of equity, diversity and inclusion)
   

For the FY 2024-25, the University’s notional allocation is $10.7 M with the percentage of projects by the following eligible category as follows.

• Innovation and commercialization activities: 10.2%
• Facilities renewal, including deferred maintenance: 61.6%
• Information resources, including digital resources, open access and databases: 36.1%
• Equity, diversity and faculty renewal: 2.1%
   

For further detail, please see Institutional Performance Indicators for the upcoming year.

• U of T IPG 2024-25 Institutional Performance Objectives
   

In addition, the University is responsible for reporting outcomes on a yearly basis. Please see the following for details.

• U of T IPG 2023-24 Institutional Performance Objectives
• U of T IPG 2022-23 Institutional Performance Objectives
• U of T IPG 2021-22 Institutional Performance Objectives
• U of T IPG 2020-21 Institutional Performance Objectives
• U of T IPG 2019-20 Institutional Performance Objectives
• U of T IPG 2018-19 Institutional Performance Objectives

Research security is categorized as a fifth priority area of the IPGs. These investments are aligned with the RSF’s objectives to help Canadian post-secondary institutions ensure their federally funded research projects are conducted in world-class facilities with the best equipment and administrative support available. By directing funds to specific investments and to annual or multiyear projects initiated by institutions, research security funding will help to build capacity within post-secondary institutions to identify, assess and mitigate the potential risks to research security.

For the FY2024-25 the University’s notional allocation is $4.1M

For further detail, please see Institutional Performance Indicators for the upcoming year.

• 2024-2025 Research Security Fund Institutional Performance Objectives
   

In addition, the University is responsible for reporting outcomes on a yearly basis. Please see the following for details.

• 2023-2024 Research Security Fund Institutional Performance Objectives
• 2022-2023 Research Security Fund Institutional Performance Objectives

• Facilitate the preparation and submission of the application, dissemination of funds and collection of data for yearly reports