Shs50 billion earmarked for SME research and innovation
Maxwell Otim of Uganda National Council of Science (L) talks to Melissa Plath of University of Jyvaskyla Finland at a workshop in Kampala on Wednesday. photo BY STEPHEN WANDERA
What you need to know:
Impression. The winners’ work must have had a positive impact on peoples’ lives.
KAMPALA.
Researchers and innovators attached to universities and organisations, whose work has a positive impact on small and medium enterprises (SMEs) or peoples’ lives, stand a chance to win more than Shs50 billion non-refundable grant.
Total funds available for Horizon 2020, which commenced this month is about 400 million Euros (about Shs134 billion), meaning that the money available for Uganda could increase depending on the participation which could also determine the number of people to qualify for the research and innovation funds.
The funding will focus on priorities such as research infrastructures, Marie Curie (Mobility Grants—exchange programme-like), future and emerging technologies.
It will also look at advanced computing, future Internet, content technologies and information management, let alone societal challenges – health, food security & agriculture, energy, transport, climate action and environment, and SMEs innovation.
“This is a win-win situation for all the partners that will be involved,” the Coordinator for Innovation Society Technology (IST) Africa, Paul Cunningham said yesterday (Thursday) in an interview in Kampala.
This is because entries will be according to partners—who must come from at least three different countries with European countries being among them.
And the benefits of the research and innovation will not just be enjoyed in those countries but they will also reap from the intellectual property rights jointly.
Critics, however, say this project will benefit European much more than African countries but the proponents of the idea say the benefits will be exploited or shared equally across the partners.
Horizon 2020 addresses all research and innovation funding that was previously provided through the Framework Programmes for Research and Technical Development (FP7), Competitiveness and Innovation Programme (CIP) and European Institute of Innovation and Technology.
