The dates of the call are provisional and subject to change. The content will be further developed and refined until the call opens.
This call welcomes researchers who have recently received a doctorate or who are at an early stage of their career. You can apply for funding to conduct your own research project, where you formulate your own research question, within Formas’ areas of responsibility: Environment, Agricultural Sciences, and Spatial Planning. We encourage interdisciplinary research questions.
The Career Grant for Early-career Researchers call gives you as an early-career researcher the possibility to improve your leadership skills, run your own project, and contribute to the clear advancement of the state of knowledge within Formas’ areas of responsibility. It is also meant to contribute to the next step in your career. The Career Grant aims to broaden your perspectives, help you to become more independent, and enable you to take the next step in your career. This is done by taking on a new or partially new focus for your research compared with your previous work.
To expand your opportunities for improved career development, your project should include national or international mobility to other research environments. The mobility is intended to improve your abilities and opportunities to contribute to research relevant to society and of the highest scientific quality. It should also contribute to new impressions, ideas, and perspectives, preferably in, for you, new or partially new subject areas. Your research mobility and the project in general should also expand your networks and your skills in cooperating and collaborating with others.
Knowledge creation is a complex process, created under widely varying conditions, timeframes, methods, and publication patterns. There are a variety of ways of pursuing a research career, all of which can lead to research of high scientific quality. As applicant, you are given wide-ranging flexibility to design the project and the mobility according to the conditions and needs of your field of research.
You can apply for a 3- or 4-year project with a budget of at most SEK 1.5 million per year on average over the years applied for.
The Career Grant for Early-career Researchers call supports researchers in two different critical stages in their career development and is conducted in two tracks:
- Research projects for career age 0–3 for individuals who have a doctorate issued from 1 January 2023 to 1 October 2026.
- Research projects for career age 4–7 for individuals who have a doctorate issued from 1 January 2019 to 31 December 2022.
Applications may only be for one track. This call text explains the framework for track 0–3. Note that granted projects can only be conducted by the applicant personally. Changing project leader is therefore not permitted.
Purpose and focus area
Society is in great need of individuals with a combination of teaching skills and qualified subject knowledge who can contribute to, and eventually lead efforts on, solving societal challenges, both nationally and globally.
The purpose of the call is to give promising early-career researchers appropriate opportunities for taking the next step in their careers, encouraging an interdisciplinary direction, developing independence, and contributing to innovative research environments. Projects are to support the development of expertise within Formas’ areas of responsibility Environment, Agricultural Sciences, and Spatial Planning (see below), and aim to contribute to the clear advancement in the state of knowledge. Ultimately, the call should strengthen researchers early in their careers and their opportunities to work in leading positions within academia, the public sector, civil society, or business. The aim of the call is to strengthen society’s access to expertise within Formas’ areas of responsibility and to contribute to continuous and long-term knowledge development. A range of skills are necessary for making science-based judgements, taking concrete measures, and solving societal challenges in the long run.
Formas supports research of the highest scientific quality. The research can include both different scientific methods and perspectives, as well as different disciplinary and interdisciplinary approaches. It can be useful in the short and/or long term and is to be of relevance for the ecological, economic, and/or social sustainable development of society. Granted research by Formas must belong to one of Formas’ areas of responsibility: Environment, Agricultural Sciences, and Spatial Planning. For a project to be considered within Formas’ areas of responsibility, it must be clearly demonstrated how the project can contribute to these areas. Research projects that are deemed to fall outside Formas’ areas of responsibility cannot be granted funding and will be rejected.
Formas’ areas of responsibility are described under three headings below, but they should not be considered as three separate areas. Knowledge needs often involve complex issues that are at the intersection of the environment, agricultural sciences, and spatial planning. The call encourages questions about policy instruments, regulations, and political decisions, but also about norms, values, and behaviours that touch on perspectives cutting across all of Formas’ areas of responsibility. This includes questions considering the conditions and needs of different groups, so that the project can contribute to knowledge that is reflective of and relevant to different groups in society. Common aspects for all three areas include questions dealing with learning from different contexts and places and questions related to the past, present and future.
Environment
The area of responsibility Environment deals with the interaction between people and the environment and the promotion of sustainable societies and viable ecosystems. This includes issues relating to climate, the environment, biodiversity, ecosystem services, resource efficiency, and a chemical-safe future. The area also includes issues relating to the Earth system and soil, air, and water processes. Climate includes, for example, the climate system and changes to it, measures to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, and improved understanding of the effects of climate change and/or climate adaptations. Environment also includes issues relating to more environmentally friendly and socio-economically sustainable ways of utilising existing resources as well as sustainable products, materials, and consumption. The area also includes issues relating to how people relate to nature and its values, and how these changes over time, as well as society’s ability to value and manage issues such as environmental pollution, climate risks, and environmental changes.
Agricultural Sciences
The area of responsibility Agricultural Sciences deals with forestry, agriculture, soil and land use, food, animal health, and animal welfare from a multitude of perspectives. This includes issues relating to the different uses and values of forests, and synergies and trade-offs between them. Issues relating to agriculture and food includes the entire food system, with production, processing, distribution, preparing, and consumption of food, and taking care of residues. This also includes the access of different societal groups to safe, nutritious, healthy, sustainable and tasty food. Animal health and animal welfare include sporting- and companion animals, laboratory animals, farm animals on land and in water, and their health and wellbeing. This includes the spread of disease between animals, and between humans and animals. The area Agricultural Sciences also includes issues relating to land use, soil health and land issues related to the extraction of strategic minerals and raw materials.
Spatial Planning
The area of responsibility Spatial Planning deals with urban, rural, and regional planning, design, and construction of the built environment, as well as the use, management, recycling, and demolition of buildings, homes, places, landscapes, and infrastructures. It also deals with the relationships between places, buildings, and social functions, how they are used, and how people move from one place to another. Spatial Planning includes both cultural and natural environments and how communities and the built environment can be made inclusive, safe, and adapted to future challenges. Spatial Planning includes all aspects of sustainable development with a focus on meeting the need for good living environments for everyone, now and in the future. This includes balancing different interests and goal conflicts about which values should be decisive when planning and building sustainable societies for people and the environment.
Information webinar January 28 at 11.00
Contact
For questions regarding the content of the call and administrative questions: careergrant@formas.se