Bilateral research cooperation Québec

The FWO is keen on promoting international collaboration as a driving force for excellence. That is why the FWO signs bilateral agreements with a number of countries for the funding of joint research projects. These projects go further than the traditional mobility projects, because personnel and consumables as well as equipment can also be financed.

One of the selected countries/regions is the Canadian province Québec. The FWO has reached an agreement with the ‘Fonds de Recherche de Québec’ (FRQ) to finance interdisciplinary fundamental research projects covering research domains falling under at least two of the three branches of the FRQ (FRQNT, FRQS of FRQSC).

In contrast to the regular research projects fundamental research no distinction is made between junior and senior research projects. In addition, it is not possible to use 10% of the budget requested at FWO for non-Flemish research institutes.

• Next call expected spring 2026
• Joint research project with partners from the Canadian province Québec. It must be an integrated research proposal with one central problem, methodology and work plan.
• Fundamental research in all scientific domains. However, to promote interdisciplinary research, the project proposal (research and composition bilateral team) must cover research domains falling under at least two of the three branches of FRQ:
  • FRQNT – Nature and Technologies
  • FRQS - Health
  • FRQSC – Society and Culture
• Project duration: 3 years
• Personnel costs and consumables applied for at FWO: minimally € 45,000 and maximally € 85,000 per year per project. If you want to use core facilities during the execution of your project, do make sure that the fees for that use are budgeted correctly in the consumables expenditure category.
• Equipment/matching funding applied for at FWO: maximally € 150,000 per project
• Call closed
  
• Announcement results: December 2023
• Project start: 1^st of January 2024

• The collaboration with partners from the Canadian province of Québec will have an added value for the project.
• Your research will be carried out at an eligible Flemish main host institution, possibly in collaboration with other Flemish and/or federal research institutions (Article 7) and under the supervision of a supervisor-spokesperson, possible in collaboration with other (co-)supervisor(s) (Article 10 - 12).
• In the framework of this call with FRQ, you can only act once as a supervisor(-spokesperson) or (co-supervisor).
• No remuneration or accumulation of a remuneration is allowed for (co-)supervisor(s)(-spokesperson) under a research project funded by FWO
• Applications in the framework of this cooperation are not part of the regular project competition and as a result:
  • do not count for the maximum of two projects per application round for which you may act as (co-)supervisor(-spokesperson);
  • are not taken into account for the maximum of two projects applied for and ongoing on the start date of the newly allocated project.
• You agree with the Research Integrity Clause.

• Carefully read the guidelines for applicants.
• You submit your joint application via FWO E-loket before the deadline. Please note that each online FWO submission is automatically confirmed by a confirmation email. If you did not receive such an email, please verify whether you properly submitted your application.
  • No submission needs to be done at FRQ: The complete application, including budget for the Québec part of the application as well as a Canadian Common CV + declaration by the applicant for each Québec (co-)supervisor(-spokesperson), must be submitted to FWO.
  • Each (co-)supervisor(-spokesperson) of both the Flemish and Québec research team must have a fully updated online FWO E-loket profile including an up to date list of publications. Please note that the registration of your E-loket profile (login/password) takes 24 hours. It is therefore strongly advised to start well in advance;
  • Each Flemish (co-)supervisor(-spokesperson) needs to add via the Flemish supervisor-spokesperson a short CV to the FWO application. Please do use the template provided in the FWO application form.
• FWO and FRQ perform an eligibility check to verify if your application meets all formal criteria of respectively FWO and NRF.
• Your application is sent out for international peer review. For this call FRQ will be in charge of this task.
• An ad hoc joint interdisciplinary selection committee composed of Flemish and Québec experts makes a final ranking.
• The Board of Trustees of FWO and FRQ take the final decision.
• Afterwards you will receive feedback on this decision.

Remark: In case of transfer of personal data within the framework of an international collaboration, FWO will ensure that the partners abroad guarantee an equal level of protection with respect to the involved parties.