National funding for research
In general, most of the research carried out in Serbia is funded by the national funds, managed by the Ministry of education, science and technological development. Besides research projects, the ministry also funds or co-funds HR development and bilateral scientific cooperation.
Funding HR development
In 2012, some 5% of the total budget (government) for science in Serbia was allocated for development of human resources. This budget is spent on the programs of incentives and funding for researchers.
A program of incentives and funding for young researchers for the period of 2012-2015, is brought by the Ministry for Education, Sciences and Technology. The program addresses R&D organizations, high school students who participated in international science competitions and graduated students. It foresees 1) the funding for pariticipation in scientific events in country and abroad, 2) secondments for the purpose of scientific research or collaboration development, 3) funding for experiments carried out in scope of PhD thesis completion, 4) covering administrative costs related to PhD thesis defence, 5) publishing WoS journal papers.
Similar program is developed for the researchers in general and it will support: 1) participation on the scientific events and meetings abroad; 2) study visits of foreign researchers to Serbia; 3) post-doctoral research activities. This programme addresses only R&D organizations.
For both of the programmes, Ministry regularly announces a public call (at the beginning of year) which is continuously opened, throughout the whole year. Procedure for applying is simple and decisions are made in most of the cases 30 days upon submitting the application.
