A program agreement was signed between Estonia, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway on June 18th, according to which Estonia will utilize more than eight million euros’ worth of support of the European Economic Area (EEA) Financial Mechanism Programme for carrying out research and higher education cooperation projects.
The volume of the program with co-funding by the Estonian state will be 8.4 million euros, of which foreign aid is 7.1 million euros. The program will last until 2021, the Estonian Ministry of Education and Research said.
Head of the research department of the ministry, Katrin Pihor, said that now Estonian scientists will have a good opportunity for including Latvian, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Icelandic and Liechtensteiner partners in their research. “The first application round of the Baltic research cooperation program is planned to be opened this fall,” she said.
The support to be allocated will be divided between different activities, 6 million of which is meant for cooperation projects. At least one of the partners of the projects to be supported would have to be from Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and one from Latvia or Lithuania.
In addition, universities can apply for support for the study travels of their employees, developing their curricula and for higher education cooperation projects. The planned sum earmarked for this field is 1.3 million euros.
The main goal of the support is to help reduce economic and social inequality in the EEA and to strengthen bilateral relations between donor countries and countries that receive help in priority fields, including education and research.
