Sustainable and Liveable Cities and Urban Areas

The pilot call Sustainable and Liveable Cities and Urban Areas organized by JPI Urban Europe and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC), inviting interdisciplinary Sino-European consortia opened on January 31st, 2018.

In answer to the global urbanisation challenge, NSFC and JPI Urban Europe have agreed to a long-term cooperation under the strategic theme Sustainable Urbanisation in the Context of Economic Transformation and Climate Change. The pilot call is a joint initiative of nine European funding agencies participating in JPI Urban Europe and NSFC in China.

In the call the following three thematic themes will be addressed:

• Reduce the adverse environmental impact of cities, paying special attention to the quality of air, water and soil, and municipal and other waste management;
• Access to safe, affordable, and sustainable housing, transportation and basic services; and
• Integrated policies towards inclusion, resource efficiency, mitigation and adaptation to climate change and resilience to disasters.

The call invites researchers from Chinese and European universities, research institutes, research and technology organisations (including municipal research institutes), cities and city planning departments, as well as European companies.

The total funding available in this programme is approximately M€ 9.35 on the European side, across the participating European funding agencies. NSFC will fund the Chinese part of all projects.

The call topics

• Climate change and new urban economies
• Transformation of energy systems and strengthen urban circular economies
• Urban public administration and services innovation
• Urban data management

The Chinese funding agency in this call is:

• National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC), China

The following European funding agencies are participating in the call:

• Austrian Research Promotion Agency (FFG), Austria
• Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique (F.R.S. -FNRS), Belgium
• Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR), France
• Ministry of Education and Science (IZM), Latvia
• Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO), The Netherlands
• The Research Council of Norway (RCN), Norway
• National Science Centre (NCN), Poland
• Swedish Energy Agency (SWEA), Sweden
• Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), United Kingdom

Available budget

The total funding available in this programme is approximately M€ 9.35 on the European side, across the participating European funding agencies. NSFC will fund the Chinese part of all projects to be funded under this programme. Each national funding agency will provide funds directly to their eligible investigators in accordance to the agencies’ rules and regulations.

Proposal requirements

Projects funded under the present call will be Sino-European collaborative actions with a minimum consortium size of two (and maximum three) Chinese partners (from different institutions and coordinated by one principal investigator (PI) who is partner in the project) and a minimum of two European partners (from different European countries). For the coordination of the projects, the applicants will have to define one Chinese and one European researcher or organisation to act as responsible coordinators of their consortium for each of the funders (NSFC and JPI Urban Europe).

Who can participate and apply

The call addresses researchers from Chinese and European universities, research institutes, research and technology organisations (including municipal research institutes), cities and city planning departments, as well as European companies. Their eligibility for national funding will be subject to the funding rules of the participating funding organisations and are published as an annex to the call text.

Project consortium

The added value resulting from transnational cooperation must be addressed in the proposal.

There is no limit to the total number of partners who may be involved in each project. However, proposals for medium-sized projects submitted by consortia comprising applicants from approximately three to five funding agencies are expected.

Consortia need to be balanced between Europe and China, both in terms of number of partners and distribution of budget.

What can be applied for

Project duration

Projects can have duration of three or four years. For Chinese partners, the duration can be only three years. For European partners, a maximum of four years of project duration shall be possible for PhD students or post -docs involved in a project. Projects should start in January-April 2019. The exact starting date may depend on the budget allocation (rules) of the specific funding agencies.

Budget of the call and maximum funding of projects

The total funding available in this programme is approximately M€ 9.35 on the European side, across the participating European funding agencies. NSFC will fund the Chinese part of all projects to be funded under this programme.

There are no fixed maximum limits for a project size. There are, however, (national) funding limits for the respective partners. Table 1 indicates the funds available from each of the respective national funding agencies. For more information on the specific funding  agencies’ rules, please see Annex A.

In the proposal a justification of the requested budget is required. All costs must be eligible according to the funding agencies’ rules available (see Annex A).

In case of doubt, applicants should consult their respective funding agencies to advise.

NSFC will fund the Chinese project partners. On the European side, NWO will coordinate the funding of European project partners through the participating national funding agencies on the basis of the current good practice of JPI Urban Europe. National participants in successful project proposals will only be funded by their respective national funding agency in accordance with the eligibility and funding rules of that agency.

Funding agencies’ rules and eligibility criteria

In addition to the general rules and procedures laid out in this document, there may be specific funding agencies’ rules (e.g., funding agencies’ eligibility criteria for certain organisations, co-funding requirements, national evaluation rules, etc.). It is strongly recommended that these are checked with the contact person at the respective funding agency (see Annex A) before submitting a proposal.

Please note there are limitations regarding the types of activities different funding agencies are able to support.