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Leading House MENA

The Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI) commissioned the HES⁠-⁠SO as the Leading House (LH) for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. Its overall goal is to develop scientific collaborations between Switzerland and countries of the MENA region.

Goals

The Leading House MENA has set three strategic goals:

  • Further development of the research cooperation between Switzerland and countries with a high development potential in the above mentioned region with funding instruments designed according to the interests of the Swiss research community
  • Increase of knowledge on countries with a high development potential among the Swiss research community through the availability of contacts and know how
  • Representation of the interests of the Swiss research community towards potential partners in the region.

The LH MENA in numbers

MENA institutions

Awarded projects

Swiss institutions

Interactive map of the MENA institutions


Program 2025-2028

SEFRI has confirmed that HES-SO will coordinate Leading House MENA for a third term, from 2025 to 2028. The activities planned for these four years will be presented in early 2025.

Program 2021-2024

The Leading House MENA 2021-2024 mandate was officially launched at the Kick-off Event 2021-2024 on October 18, 2021. You can find the presentations and excerpts from this event on the following page.

For the 2021-2024 period, the focus is on cooperation for research projects, with the introduction of “Research partnership grants”, a regular instrument that is launched three years in a row. This is followed by a larger instrument, the “Consolidation grants”, launched in the second half of the term.

Each call is announced individually on this website and by email. You can subscribe to our mailing list by writing to lhmena(at)hes-so.ch

In another development for the Leading House, these instruments are now open to all MENA countries, except in special cases: Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Occupied Palestinian Territory, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, Yemen.

Detailed conditions and eligibility criteria are specified in the regulations for each instrument.

During the first four-year mandate, the Leading House MENA funded 35 projects with instruments supporting mobility, research and innovation. More information on the funded projects can be found on the pages below.