New national funding opportunities for research

The Malta Council for Science and Technology has launched the National R&I Programme 2009 to support research and innovation in science and technology in the Maltese Islands.

The new programme falls under the strategic plan: "National Strategic Plan for Research and Innovation: 2007-2010 - Building and Sustaining the R&I Enabling Framework".

The strategy presents a vision for research and innovation in Malta as well as a set of underpinning strategic principles that guided the formulation of the plan. The vision proposed for 2007 - 2010 is "Research and Innovation at the heart of the Maltese economy to support value-added growth and wealth."

The National Research and Innovation Programme 2009 is one of the instruments proposed in the national strategy in support of its aims. It is a funding programme for research and innovation carried out by local organisations and will be operated in accordance with the strategic principles and recommendations of the national strategic plan.

The 2009 programme focuses on the four priority sectors identified in the National R&I Strategy, namely the environment, information and communication technology, value added manufacturing services, and health and biotechnology.

The environment and energy resources sector pays particular attention to solar, wind and bio energy together with energy efficiency technologies, as well as water, desalination, waste rehabilitation technologies, soil and marine management.

ICT includes software development related to bridging technologies in security, hardware, telecommunications, health, marine and specialised applications.

Value-Added manufacturing and services focuses on building SMEs as cluster elements in value-added manufacturing and services provision.

Health and biotech deals with human genetics while bio-informatics deals with the support of clinical trials for transition of generic pharmaceuticals.

The call was launched last week and interested participants can submit their proposals until September 11. Evaluations will be completed by the September 23, while the estimated timeframe for negotiations and signing of contracts is between October and November of this year.

Project proposals submitted through this call should typically have a duration of between one and three years. Shorter projects are preferred but projects with different timeframes may be considered at the discretion of the council. The MCST is looking to fund projects of between €50,000 and €100,000.

The MCST will be holding an information session on this funding programme tomorrow at 9.30 am at Villa Bighi, Kalkara.

www.mcst.gov.mt