The UK Government's Department for International Development (DfID) is investing up to £3 million a year in a new Development Partnerships in Higher Education programme (DelPHE), which will run for a seven year period, from June 2006 to March 2013. The programme will provide funding to support partnerships between Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) working on collaborative activity linked to the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

The overall goal of DelPHE is to enable HEIs to act as catalysts for poverty reduction and sustainable development. DelPHE aims to achieve this by building and strengthening the capacity of HEIs to contribute towards the MDGs and promote science and technology related knowledge and skills. It is anticipated that around 200 partnerships will be funded during the lifetime of the scheme.

HEIs will be eligible to apply for funding from DFID’s 22 bilateral focus countries listed below.The list includes some of the world's lowest income countries and are those for which DFID is publicly accountable for progress against MDGs.

Africa: Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Asia: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Vietnam and Yemen.