General EFSD Rules and Regulations

Unless specified otherwise, EFSD grant programmes are only open to applicants from single non-profit institutions or groups of such institutions from Europe and associated countries (for detailed country list, please see here). For fellowships, please check individual programme details.

EFSD currently does not accept applications for grants or fellowships from scientists working in Russian institutions. This does not mean that research by Russian citizens is disqualified, only research by and originating from Russian institutions.

The principal investigator and any co-investigators of EFSD grant programmes must be normally employed at a non-profit institution and the study must be performed at their place of work based in Europe or an associated country.  

Unless specified otherwise, applicants to all EFSD programmes must be paid-up members of EASD. Details on how to become a member can be found on the EASD website www.easd.org or contact membership@easd.org for further information.

The duration of each grant may be one year or longer, depending upon the needs of the project and as justified in the application.

Studies forming part of a larger project will be considered for funding, but this will need to be well justified in the application.

Investigators may only hold one single EFSD award at any given time. This regulation applies to principal investigators as well as co-investigators. It does not apply to collaborators. The EFSD Rising Star Fellowship Programme, EFSD Future Leaders Mentorship Programme for Clinical Diabetologists and EFSD Albert Renold Travel Fellowship Programme are exempt from this regulation.

Recipients of an EFSD award may apply for new funding to the same or to another EFSD programme on the condition that the current award is nearing completion (within six months). In this case, the new award cannot be activated until the existing project has been terminated and a final scientific report received and accepted.

Please note that applications for renewed/continued funding of an existing award will be considered as a new application ("competitive renewal").

As investigators may not hold more than one EFSD award at a time, this may create a problem when a second investigator wishes to apply for EFSD support from within a research group which already holds an active EFSD grant. Such applications will only be considered if the principal investigator named on the second grant can provide clear evidence that he or she is a fully independent researcher. To demonstrate such independence, the PI is required to provide a statement co-signed by the existing grant holder which confirms that (a) the PI on the new application will appear either as first or last author on any publications arising from the work that may be funded by EFSD, and (b) that the existing active grant holder will NOT feature as first or last author on any such publications. This undertaking is included in the programme application process, and must be submitted with the application. Any breach of the above publication rule may lead to immediate withdrawal of EFSD funding from both PIs.

All applications will be subject to scientific review by a specialised and independent ad hoc committee. At the discretion of the Review Committee, applications for EFSD awards may undergo pre-review (or triage). In this event, any application rejected at this stage will not be subject to a complete scientific review and no feedback report will be provided to the applicant.

Grant/Fellowship activation documents must be returned to the EFSD Office within six months from the date of the EFSD award confirmation email. In exceptional cases and with the prior permission of the EFSD Office, this time period may be extended a further six months.  Any funding which has not been activated within twelve months of the award date will be automatically withdrawn.

Please note that a copy of the confirmation and/or signature page of all ethical approval/s which are needed to carry out the funded project have to be attached to the award activation documents but are not required at the application stage.

Grants of up to Euro 100,000 are usually paid as one lump sum, unless specified otherwise. Larger amounts are divided over the research period and applicants are requested to submit an interim progress report shortly before the planned start of the next budget period. The approval of this report will activate the payment of the next funding instalment. Should it be deemed that scientific progress has been inadequate the report will not be approved in which case EFSD reserves the right to delay or cease payment of any further instalments.

If funding for the same budget items requested from EFSD for the project is obtained from other sources, funding for those items by EFSD will be withdrawn (i.e. EFSD will not cover costs that are already covered through other funding sources or that become so during the course of the funding period). 

EFSD funding is to be acknowledged in all scientific publications, abstracts to scientific meetings and poster presentations in relation, either partly or fully, to the EFSD funded project, by the wordings specified in the award activation documents. Failure to respect this requirement may result in administrative rejection of future applications to EFSD, and termination of payment of outstanding instalments in grants of longer duration.

If an EFSD-funded project requires significant changes in its research plan, budget allocations (> Euro 10,000) or a no-cost extension, the principal investigator needs to receive written approval from the EFSD Office.

All recipients of an EFSD award are required to submit a scientific report at the end of the project period. As mentioned above, for those projects where funding is administered in instalments, interim progress reports will also be required and such reports will be subject to assessment prior to the release of any further funds.

For additional, programme-specific regulations, focus areas, review criteria, funding amounts and eligibility criteria, refer to the individual programme Request for Application (RFA).

If you have any questions regarding the above, please contact the EFSD Office at foundation@easd.org.