Deadline: 15-Nov-22
The European Commission (EC) is pleased to announce an open call for the Fostering balanced brain circulation – ERA Talents to support training and mobility of researchers, innovators, and other research and innovation talents across sectors with a particular focus on widening countries.
The grant covers expenses related to the ERA Talents participating organisations and individual talents hosted/seconded (administrative costs, training costs, travel and subsistence costs and salaries for seconded staff, and costs associated with dissemination & communication and transfer of knowledge).
Scope
- Experimentation. Complementary to ERA Chairs, Excellence Hubs, ERA Fellowships and MSCA Staff Exchanges, the ERA Talents scheme promotes innovative inter-sectoral collaboration in research and innovation through cross-sectoral exchange of staff, with a focus on widening countries.
- Intersectoral mobility. Actions are invited to develop activities in view of realising one or more of the following European Commission’s objectives regarding intersectoral mobility.
- Participating organisations. ERA Talents actions must involve organisations from the academic and non-academic sectors. The consortium partners contribute directly to the implementation of a joint training and mobility methodology by seconding and/or hosting eligible staff members.
- Seconded staff. Support is provided for inter-sectoral mobility of R&I staff leading to knowledge transfer and increased employability between participating organisations. Costs to be claimed by beneficiaries should be mainly linked to seconded personnel in the form of salaries, training, travel, and subsistence packages. The joint training and mobility methodology presented by the applicant consortium should include an approach to identify a diverse audience of research and innovation talents engaging in the action, outlined in the application.
- Proposers are requested to provide an estimate of the number of ‘ERA talents’ the action is going to provide with a mobility opportunity. Secondments are open to researchers, innovators, and other research and innovation talents – such as administrative, managerial and technical staff supporting R&I activities in their organisations – from any career stage, excluding though doctoral candidates (PhD students). For innovators and other R&I talents, emphasis needs to be put on staff at an early career stage.
- Return and reintegration. A mandatory return phase for every cross-border secondment from a widening country has to be included in the secondment methodology, equal to the duration of the secondment, but not more than 12 months. Support, excluding salaries, for such return phase on the grant is allowed for up to 12 months after the first secondment, within the duration of the grant.
- Strengthening careers and collaboration. For participating staff members, the project should offer new skills acquisition and career development perspectives. Participating organisations must ensure that the seconded staff (ERA talents) are adequately mentored. Preference will be given to actions that propose secondment mechanisms offering improved and more sustainable career prospects to the ERA talents (e.g. with follow-up position at the sending organisation after the secondment duration), thus maximising the impact of the action for knowledge sharing and long-term collaboration.
Funding Information
- The check will normally be done for the coordinator if the requested grant amount is equal to or greater than EUR 500 000, except for:
- public bodies (entities established as a public body under national law, including local, regional or national authorities) or international organisations; and
- cases where the individual requested grant amount is not more than EUR 60 000 (lowvalue grant).
- Grants have an expected duration of up to 4 years.
Expected Outcomes
Projects are expected to contribute to several of the following outcomes:
- Strengthened human capital base in R&I of Widening countries, with more entrepreneurial and better-trained researchers, innovators and other R&I talents;
- A more balanced talent circulation, both geographical and cross-sectoral;
- Boosted R&I capacity and R&I support capacity, as well as contribution to increased excellence of the research-performing organisation in widening countries;
- A more structured and impactful collaboration between academia and businesses;
- Increased set of research, entrepreneurial and other transferable skills and competences;
- Improved employability and sustainable career prospects of diverse talents within academia, industry and beyond.
Eligibility Criteria
To be eligible for funding, applicants must be established in one of the eligible countries, i.e.:
- the Member States of the European Union, including their outermost regions;
- the Overseas Countries and Territories (OCTs) linked to the Member States;
- eligible non-EU countries:
- countries associated to Horizon Europe;
- low- and middle-income countries.
For more information, visit https://bit.ly/3ysk3yF