EMDG grantees must submit a milestone report for assessment. Your grant agreement will specify:
To help complete your milestone report, read the sample EMDG online milestone report which contains useful tips and instructions. You can find the relevant one for you on our grant round page.
You must submit a milestone report for the financial year. This is regardless of the amount you spent. If you have not spent any money, you must still submit a report to advise that you have not incurred any expenditure.
The timing of your payments is set out in your grant agreement. We may pay a portion of your grant funding before you start your grant activity.
We will make payments to the bank account you nominated in your grant agreement.
Each grant agreement determines the timing of your payments. Grant agreements:
This is provided you:
The amount in your grant agreement is the maximum you will receive. We may pay your grant in full or in part:
Your grant agreement will include a payment breakdown.
You cannot request a change to the payment breakdown.
Round 4 grantees will be paid from the funding allocated to EMDG in the 2025-26 and 2026-27 financial years. This means you will receive your grant payments in the year of the grant activity.
The grant agreement outlines your payment and reporting schedule.
Payment timing is set out in your grant agreement. We may pay a portion of your grant funding before you start your grant activity subject to the risk assessment. Risk assessment is a matter for Austrade.
If the payment schedule of your grant agreement includes an initial payment at the start of the grant year, you can expect to receive your initial payment of $20,000 from the start of the grant activity year.
To receive another payment up to the limit of your maximum grant amount outlined in the grant agreement during the grant activity year, you must submit a milestone report with eligible expenditure.
You won’t get a payment until we:
Please keep good records for all eligible expenditure in case an assessor asks you for them. We conduct random audits to ensure integrity and absence of fraud.
We will only make milestone payments if:
So we can assess your milestone report, you need to show us that you:
You need to document evidence for eligible expenses you incur for your grant agreement. Your grant agreement will specify what evidence you need to provide with your milestone report.
We may ask you for further evidence such as:
We may contact your overseas representative, in person or by phone. This is to confirm details of any activities they conducted on your behalf.
Read the guide EMDG milestone reports - How to input eligible expenses (DOCX 350KB).
You must match the dollar value of the grant that is stated in your grant agreement. This means you must show your spending on eligible expenses for double your grant amount.
The amount in your grant agreement is the maximum grant you will receive per financial year.
The minimum grant that you will receive per financial year is $20,000. If your spending is less than double this amount, you will not receive a grant payment.
If you received an initial payment of $20,000 at the start of the grant year but did not spend it, you will be required to repay it or have it offset against a future grant payment under your existing grant agreement.
You cannot use funding from other Commonwealth, state, territory or local government sources to fund your share of eligible expenditure or matched contribution.
You, as the grantee, must own or manage the bank account in your grant agreement. Please check your bank account details are correct. Errors will delay payments.
Read about how to change your account details in your grant agreement.
Submit your report using the EMDG online portal.
You must submit your milestone report even when you have not incurred any expenditure.
We assess milestone reports and, if eligible, make payments.
We assess milestone reports in the order we receive them. The earlier you submit your report, the earlier you are likely to receive your payment.
The EMDG online portal is open for Round 4 milestone report submissions.
This is for eligible expenditure incurred in the 2025-26 financial year.
Milestone reports are due just prior to the end of the financial year. This ensures Austrade receives them in the year of the program appropriation and grant activity. This is important so we can process payments and payment accruals.
It’s important to submit your milestone report during the grant activity year as soon as you complete the grant activities. You can only submit one milestone report per grant activity year.
For more information, go to Grant rounds.