HONOLULU — The University of Hawai‘i was incredibly competitive in obtaining research funding this past fiscal year, blowing by its previous record by $100 million.
UH snagged $616 million in the 2024 fiscal year, up 19 percent from $516 million a year earlier, which followed only a 2 percent gain from $505 million in the 2022 fiscal year, according to university officials.
Vassilis Syrmos, UH vice president for research and innovation, called the results an impressive achievement by a premier research institution that will boost jobs, business income, tax revenue, student education and wider knowledge.
“I never thought that the university would exceed $600 million in my life,” Syrmos, who is 59 and has been at UH since 1991, said Monday at a ceremony on campus in Manoa announcing the achievement.
The funding represents appropriations that were awarded during the recent fiscal year, which ended June 30, and then often get expended over multiple years. These appropriations, which UH refers to as extramural funding, include only competitive awards from external entities such as the federal government, private industry and nonprofit organizations.
Syrmos said the big gain stemmed from over $100 million in addition funding from the federal government compared with the prior year, and that efforts by UH personnel often take several years to result in awards.
“This number doesn’t happen overnight,” he said.
U.S. Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawai‘i, said she wasn’t aware just how competitive UH was with research funding opportunities.
“This is not money that is just handed to us,” she said during the ceremony.
U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawai‘i, said the expertise of UH researchers in many fields makes it easier to tap federal funding.
“We can look our colleagues in the eye and executive branch agencies in the eye and say the University of Hawai‘i system is world-class and a federal dollar spent here is a federal dollar well spent,” he said.
Schatz noted that the kinds of research funded matters a lot in addition to the amount of money UH obtained.
“It’s climate action, it’s climate adaptation, it’s science in the context of culture,” he said at the ceremony. “It’s Native Hawaiian health, it’s Native Hawaiian education, it’s ocean conservation, it’s terrestrial ecosystem conservation and invasive species management.”
U.S. Rep. Ed Case, D- Hawai‘i, said UH research has been highly relevant in areas of knowledge benefiting the country and the world.
“This is just a reflection on incredible ability, expertise, etc.,” he said. “So congratulations for that.”
Examples of project awards this past fiscal year include:
• $10.6 million from the Lynker Corp. for the UH College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources to help Hawai‘i farmers, ranchers and foresters implement climate-smart practices and to establish stronger markets for locally produced healthful food and products.
• $5.8 million from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration for the UH Institute for Astronomy to continue a wide area survey of near space objects at its Pan-STARRS observatory atop Haleakala on Maui.
• $4.6 million from the U.S. Forest Service to CTAHR to collect and reproduce seeds from noninvasive vegetation that can be planted to reduce wildfire risks.
• $4.1 million from the Henry M. Jackson Foundation for the Advancement of Military Medicine to the UH System Office of Strategic Health Initiatives to establish a health registry to help people affected by the Navy’s Red Hill fuel spill and water crisis.
• $824,999 from the National Science Foundation to Windward Community College to advance cybersecurity education in collaboration with multiple tribal colleges.
The UH Manoa flagship campus accounted for $465 million of the extramural awards, followed by UH System-level units ($71 million), community colleges ($51 million), UH Hilo ($23 million) and UH West O‘ahu ($6 million).
UH officials said that based on a 2021 economic impact report by the UH Economic Research Organization, estimated benefits from $615 million in extramural funding include $947 million in business sales, $434 million in employee earnings and $53 million in state tax revenue that helps support more than 10,000 jobs.
Gov. Josh Green, who also participated in Monday’s ceremony, lauded the positive economic development impacts for the state and said the university is thriving under UH President David Lassner, who announced in September that he will retire at the end of this year after leading the 10-campus system for a decade.
“You had an incredible run,” Green told Lassner. “Thank you for this work.”
Lassner also touted the economic impacts of UH research awards and said the university should aim for $1 billion.
“This is a huge economic sector for this state,” Lassner said. “These are good jobs and these are clean jobs, and these are jobs that are making a difference for the people of Hawai‘i across all of our islands, creating knowledge that makes a difference for the rest of the country and the world.”
