External Funding
Funding from external sources derives mainly from European and other international research programmes, as well as programmes run by the Research Promotion Foundation of Cyprus. Both involve competitive procedures. During the last two years, the total external funding reached €25,653,400.
A. EUROPEAN AND INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMMES
A very important aspect of the research activity of the University concerns the academic staff participation in research programmes funded by external sources, mainly European Union programmes. The University participated in 98 such programmes, securing €6.639.000 in 2009.
The European programmes in which the University participates include: EU Seventh Framework Programme and the Lifelong Learning Programme of the European Commission, ERC frontier research programmes, European Social Fund programmes such as COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) and EUROCORES (European Collaborative Research), Tempus, and the Archimed and Interreg programmes.
B. RESEARCH PROMOTION FOUNDATION INSTITUTE PROGRAMMES
Recognizing the importance of research in contemporary society, the government of the Republic of Cyprus in 1996 established the Research Promotion Foundation (RPF) to promote the development of scholarly, scientific and technological research in Cyprus. The Foundation is an independent organisation governed by a twelve-member Board of Directors, appointed by the Council of Ministers for a five-year period.
A major portion of the University’s external funding comes from the Research Promotion Foundation, since a significant number of research programmes are supported financially by the RPF. In 2009, the University secured €6.383.400 from the RPF.
The trend of the approved European and International Programmes and the Research Promotion Foundation Institute Programmes in the last years can be seen in the following graph.