Building Capacity in the Ukrainian R&I Ecosystem Webinar Series

19>19 Sep. 2025
Register before 19-09-2025 9:00

Since the outbreak of war in February 2022, Science Europe and its members have taken actions to support the National Research Foundation of Ukraine (NRFU) and the Ukrainian research ecosystem. As part of these efforts, NRFU and Science Europe are organising a series of three online workshops between September 2025 and February 2026 to tackle core topics that are priority areas for the Ukrainian research ecosystem.

About the Webinars

The overall objective of the webinar series is to support the capacity-building efforts of the Ukrainian research ecosystem. The online workshops will address three priority areas identified by the National Research Foundation of Ukraine:

  • Ensuring a good balance between bottom-up calls, mainly for basic research projects, and top-down calls for applied research projects.
  • Developing and implementing effective monitoring tools within the project life-cycle and beyond with an emphasis on the (potential) impact of the project.
  • Practices and policies that integrate Open Science principles into both evaluation procedures and project implementation.

All three webinars are scheduled to take place from 10.00–11.30 CET (11.00–12.30 EET).

Webinar 1: Balancing bottom-up and top-down research funding

The first webinar of the series will take place on 19 September 2025. It will deal with ensuring a good balance between bottom-up calls, mainly for fundamental research projects, and top-down calls for applied research projects.

Programme

10.00–10.10 Welcome and Introductory Remarks

  • Lidia Borrell-Damián, Secretary General, Science Europe
  • Olga Polotska, Executive Director of the National Research Foundation of Ukraine (NRFU)

10.10–11.20 Panel discussion

Moderator: Laure Ognois, Head of International Affairs, Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF)

  • Chiara Dezzi Bardeschi, Head of UNESCO Antenna in Ukraine
  • Anu Noorma, Director General, Estonian Research Council (ETAG), Governing Board Member of Science Europe
  • Anna di Ciaccio, Director of the National Institute for Nuclear Physics (INFN), Governing Board Member of Science Europe
  • Representative from the Swedish Research Council (VR)
  • Nicoleta Dumitrache, Head of Department, Financing development and innovation projects, Executive Agency for Higher Education, Research, Development and Innovation Funding (UEFISCDI)

11.20–11.30 Conclusions and next steps

  • Laure Ognois, Head of International Affairs, Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF)
  • Olga Polotska, Executive Director of the National Research Foundation of Ukraine (NRFU)

Webinar Schedule

  1. 2025
  2. 19 SeptemberBalancing bottom-up and top-down research funding
  3. 25 NovemberDeveloping and implementing monitoring tools for R&D projects
  4. 2026
  5. 20 FebruaryOpen Science policies and practices of research funding organisations