The answer I'm going to give is based on an initiative that our neighbours to the south have had in place for several years. Two research funding agencies in the United States, the Army Research Office and the Department of Energy, send challenges out to the community. They are challenges established by actors in the community, to which the community has an opportunity to respond. These challenges must involve multiple research teams across the country, and they also include participants in foreign countries. In fact, my own group receives funding resulting from those initiatives. These challenges, or strategic choices, are the work of the community, which proposes the avenues that it thinks are the most promising. Then, in collaboration with those research funding agencies, the choices are made and funding is granted.
On March 25th, 2022. See this statement in context.