The Marie Sklowdowska-Curie Actions Co-funding of regional, national and international programmes (COFUND) 2023 call is open as of today. The deadline for submission of proposals is 8 February 2024.

Under this call, the European Commission will award €96.6 million to support regional, national and international training and career development programmes.

COFUND provides funding for institutional, regional, national or international programmes for training, career development and mobility, through co-funding mechanisms. The scheme spreads the MSCA’s best practices by promoting high standards and excellent working and employment conditions.

COFUND projects can take the form of

Doctoral Programmes   

• offering doctoral candidates research training activities to develop and broaden their skills and competences    
• leading to the award of a doctoral degree            

Postdoctoral Programmes

• funding individual advanced research training and career development fellowships for postdoctoral researchers

Proposed programmes can cover any research disciplines ("bottom-up"), but can also focus on specific disciplines, notably when they are based on national or regional Research and Innovation Strategies for Smart Specialisation (RIS3 strategies). Funding synergies with Cohesion policy funds and the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) are strongly encouraged.

Who can apply?

A single organisation in an EU Member State or a Horizon Europe associated country applies.

Other partners can be included in the project to host and train researchers, such as

• government entities      
• regional authorities        
• funding agencies             
• universities        
• research organisations  
• enterprises

Organisations based outside these countries can join COFUND projects as associated partners to host and train doctoral and postdoctoral researchers.

Spreading best practices

COFUND spreads the MSCA’s best practices by promoting high standards and excellent working and employment conditions. It promotes sustainable training and international, interdisciplinary and inter-sectoral mobility to

• train researchers and innovators in academia and beyond 
• allow them to enlarge their networks and share knowledge to carry out cutting-edge research
• provide them with new knowledge, skills, career development perspectives and employability
• boost their creativity and entrepreneurship

These programmes will also allow organisations to attract international talent and increase their attractiveness, their research and innovation capacities and their contribution to the local, regional and/or national socio-economic ecosystems.

Funded programmes will have to consider important aspects such as

• open science
• communication
• community engagement
• entrepreneurship
• gender
• ethics
• high-quality supervision