International or external programs/projects (non-FNRS): allocation of funding for FNRS permanent mandatories
1. Principles
The FNRS encourages its researchers to take part in externally funded projects, thus increasing their funding and scientific visibility.
In practice, when FNRS permanent representatives devote time to a project (distinct from their FNRS project) with external (non-NRS) funding, the salary cost corresponding to the researcher's involvement can be covered by this funding. The host institution of the FNRS grantee will then be able to open a line of credit for an amount corresponding to the imputed salary cost and this will represent an additional source of funding, in the form of a research credit.
In order to further promote the participation of its researchers in international or external programs/projects, the FNRS Board of Directors of 21/06/2018 decided to extend this principle of imputation to other funding than the ERC. The principle of imputation therefore now concerns:
- any program dependent on the European Union.
- any program that encourages participation in projects under the European framework program (e.g.: Innoviris' Connect bonus).
- with the approval of the FNRS Board of Directors, certain other European and international programs in particular. In this case, the promoter must send its request to the FNRS via its research administration.
Within the framework of this procedure, some donors have already been approved by the Board of Directors (see list below).
- European Space Agency (ESA)
- National Institute of Health (NIH)
- Office of Naval Research - USA
- Caixa Foundation
For these, a formal request must still be sent by the universities to the FNRS research administration, but the response time will be reduced as it will no longer be subject to review by the Board of Directors.
This list is updated after each Board of Directors meeting.
2. In Practice
- The assignment of a permanent representative to a European or international program other than those referred to in Article 25, paragraph 1, a) or b) of the regulations governing permanent representatives requires prior authorization from the FNRS. The mandatary must submit a motivated request to the Direction du Pôle Administration de la Recherche du FNRS (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) via the administration of his university. This request will contain all the details necessary for its examination (funder, program, program objectives, hyperlink to the program/call, interest in participating, etc.).
- At the request of the institution (university, ...) addressed to the FNRS Financial Service (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.), the latter :
- communicates, at the time of the project set-up, an estimate of the researcher's projected costs. (As a reminder, for certain donors/certain programs, prior authorization is required, see above);
- transmits, at the time of the justification of the project costs to the donor, the details of the salary costs of the FNRS that are necessary for the institution to justify the project.
- The institution shall provide to the FNRS finance department, without request from the FNRS:
- each year on a fixed date (March 1, N), the form including in particular the names of the agents, references of the projects and percentage of valorization of the valorized researchers, completed for the past year N-1. In the probable event that the data for the year preceding the previous year (year N-2) can be clarified following the justification of costs to the funder, an updated version of the table for year N-2 is also sent;
- At the end of the use of an operating appropriation (at the time of closing the appropriation line/internal account), details of the use of the appropriation, for information purposes (free-form, no template required, as long as the nature of the expenditure is indicated).
