On September 20, at the opening ceremony of the 2026 China Zhejiang · Ningbo Talent and Technology Week, the Ningbo Municipal People’s Government and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) officially signed the China (Ningbo)–Central and Eastern European Countries Innovation Cooperation Project Joint Funding Agreement. This fund is NSFC’s first joint fund for international cooperation, marking a pioneering step taken by both sides in the field of international cooperation in basic research.
Central and Eastern European countries are located at the crossroads of the Eurasian continent and are key nodes in global industrial chains and supply chains, with deep expertise and distinctive strengths in such fields as Earth sciences, advanced manufacturing, biomedicine, and new energy.
Ningbo is a key pivot city for the Shanghai (Yangtze River Delta) International Science and Technology Innovation Center and a city known for its manufacturing single-champion enterprises. With its unique locational and institutional advantages in connecting with CEE innovation resources and aligning with local industrial needs, it has fertile ground for integrating scientific and technological innovation into industrial applications and transforming it into new quality productive forces.
The newly established China (Ningbo)–CEEC Innovation Cooperation Joint Fund has a total budget of RMB 36 million. It focuses on key fields such as the Earth system science, agriculture and germplasm resources, energy and minerals, and life and health, and is open to applications nationwide, jointly funding researchers from China and CEE countries to carry out innovative cooperation.
On this basis, both sides hope to leverage the demonstration effect of this project to guide and encourage local governments and social forces to participate, further broaden funding channels, enhance the effectiveness of funding, and explore a new path of joint funding for international scientific research cooperation featuring central-local coordination and multi-party cost-sharing. At the same time, they aim to accelerate the development of a series of international scientific research cooperation projects oriented toward industrial and national strategic needs, and produce a batch of high-quality scientific research achievements that can benefit both China and the world.
An official from the Ningbo Municipal Science and Technology Bureau stated that the implementation of this project will strongly promote Ningbo’s deep integration into the global innovation network and contribute Ningbo’s strength to the national “Belt and Road” Initiative and China-CEEC cooperation as a whole. Prior to this, Ningbo signed an agreement to deepen cooperation with the National Natural Science Foundation of China to further expand the scale of the Regional Innovation and Development Joint Fund and newly established a Joint Fund for Innovation and Development of Private Small and Medium-sized Technology-based Enterprises.
Source: Ningbo Municipal People’s Government Website