The OTKA programme, which has been supporting Hungarian scientific research for almost four decades, continues from 2024 under the name of the National Research Excel-lence Programme (NKKP), renewed in line with the highest international standards. For this purpose, following last year’s allocation of HUF 13.5 billion, this year a significantly increased grant fund of HUF 19 billion is available, which exceeds the previous amount by over 40%. The distribution of these funds will be decided by the newly established Re-search Council of Hungary, led by Hungarian Nobel laureate physicist Ferenc Krausz, based on the recommendations of international professional evaluation committees.

The strategic goal of the John von Neumann Programme, announced in 2023, is to strengthen the economic, social and scientific impact of domestic research. To achieve this, last year we reformed the system of criteria and evaluation of innovation proposals. As a next step in the process of strengthening the Hungarian research and innovation ecosystem, the Research Council of Hunga-ry - whose members were nominated by consensus by the Ministry of Culture and Innovation, the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and the Hungarian Research Network – also decided to renew the Hungarian excellence-based scientific research funding system in order to enable the best Hungarian researchers and research groups to conduct their research under internationally com-petitive conditions.

The renewal of the programme will follow the best international examples to ensure that Hungari-an researchers are not only successful in their home country but also increasingly successful in international calls, such as those announced by the European Research Council (ERC). The time-liness of the review of the proposal system is well illustrated by the fact that between 2018 and 2023, a total of 2178 OTKA proposals received almost HUF 84 billion in funding, while only 17 ERC proposals submitted from Hungary were successful in the international competition.

Not only the budget, but also the amount of individual grants that can be awarded from it has increased significantly: while previously the maximum amount of grants that could be awarded under the OTKA was HUF 48 million over 4 years, under the NKKP grants of between HUF 100 to 200 million can be awarded over 2 to 4 years, depending on the sub-programme. It is important to note that although the new scheme will primarily support internationally competitive scientific excellence, and the submission and evaluation process will be in English, the possibility for so-called Hungarikum applications will also be maintained, ensuring that research important to Hun-garian cultural heritage will also be eligible under the programme.

From the HUF 19 billion earmarked within the National Research, Development and Innovation Fund, the sub-programmes of the NKKP support domestic research on the basis of excellence, in line with successful international best practices, including the ERC’s grant schemes.

• The EXCELLENCE category is for those who have already competed in an ERC call and received a good peer review, but were not awarded a grant due to lack of funding. For them, a special funding opportunity - HUF 200 million over 2 years - will ensure the con-tinuation of promising research and preparation for a new international call, in which they are obliged to participate.
• In the ADVANCED category, experienced researchers can receive up to HUF 120 million over 4 years.
• The STARTING category supports young researchers with a doctorate degree earned within the past 7 years, allowing them to receive up to HUF 100 million over 4 years.
• The two sub-programmes for international research cooperation (NN-type), based on bi-lateral agreements between funding organisations, continue to aim at strengthening the in-ternational embeddedness of Hungarian science, supporting joint research by Hungarian research groups and their foreign partners in the Hungarian-Austrian and Hungarian-Slovenian relations.

In addition to the increase in the budget, the evaluation system will be renewed. The peer review-ers will be mostly foreign experts, and their reviews will be used to rank the proposals for excel-lence by 14 scientific evaluation boards, replacing the previous 28 juries and 4 councils. The new evaluation boards, which will normally consist of 7 members, will mostly be composed of foreign experts. The final award decisions will be taken by the Research Council of Hungary.

János Csák, Minister of Culture and Innovation, underlined: “The John von Neumann Programme is a strategic package of measures designed to forge connections between universities, research institutions and the econ-omy. In this, support for research excellence, which is greater, more focused and more consistent than ever before, plays a key role in ensuring that future Hungarian Nobel laureates can conduct their research under exceptional conditions.” The Minister added: “in addition to increasing the resources devoted to research, it is also necessary to make their use more efficient and performance-oriented, a task that is in the best possible hands with the profes-sional body led by Nobel Prize winner Professor Krausz.”

Ferenc Krausz, President of the Research Council, highlighted: “The mission of the Research Council of Hungary is to develop attractive research careers for young, talented Hungarian researchers. This is a guarantee that we will not only succeed in retaining our most talented researchers in Hungary but also attract top researchers from around the world who have demonstrated their excellence abroad. The National Research Excellence Pro-gramme is a first, but crucial, element in achieving this goal. We will continue to work to create the most attractive environment for talent in our country.”

The National Research, Development and Innovation Office, which announces and implements the programme, continues to place great emphasis on ensuring that funded projects are carried out with the simplest possible administration and flexible cost accounting, in order to allow re-searchers to focus on their research. High-quality publication is an important requirement, so that the research results generated through the grant are not only known to a narrow professional group, but also become visible to the international scientific community and even the general pub-lic.