ICoRSA Newsletter February

Author

ICoRSA
February 10, 2026

In this edition, read about:

  • The global race for research talent as political shifts and funding pressures reshape international mobility and recruitment strategies

  • Major national initiatives including Canada's $1.7 billion Global Impact+ programme, the EU's Choose Europe package, France's Choose France for Science, Germany's Global Minds Initiative, and China's Thousand Talents Plan

  • Persistent mobility barriers such as restrictive visa regimes, administrative burdens, language barriers, and unresolved qualification recognition issues

  • The precarity problem and whether project-based funding and short-term fellowships can truly address structural career challenges in research

  • Visa policy contrasts from the UK's proposed fee reductions for Global Talent visas to sharp H-1B fee increases in the United States

  • Researcher experiences navigating systems that promise ambitious opportunities yet create daily friction through bureaucracy and rigid structures

  • Open questions about whether talent attraction schemes reinforce inequalities between research systems or contribute to more sustainable research environments

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GLOBAL RACE

The Global Race for Talent in Research: Open Questions 

“Much of my physical and mental energy is consumed by bureaucracy and the daily frictions and glitches of life in Germany, forces beyond my control, that should instead be devoted to research, writing, and creative work. At the same time, hierarchical structures and rigid communication styles within German academia often stifle initiative and experimentation, making them ill-suited to a 21st-century innovation ecosystem.” (X. Alvin Yang, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science.) 

Recent political shifts and socio-economic pressures are reshaping the global research policy landscape. While funding cuts and isolationist approaches are emerging in some regions, particularly in the US, others are using this moment to position themselves as destinations for international research talent. Governments are increasingly competing through dedicated programmes and funding schemes, yet restrictive visa regimes, administrative burdens, language barriers, discriminatory assessment procedures, and unresolved qualification recognition issues continue to limit researchers’ mobility and attractiveness across systems. 

Many of these talent-attraction instruments are not new. Grants, fellowships, and international recruitment schemes have existed for years, but they are now being re-branded and expanded, often in response to geopolitical shifts such as recent developments in the US. Whether these initiatives are sufficiently ambitious, or sustainable in the long term, remains an open question. Decisions to relocate also depend heavily on family support, visa conditions, and employment security. 

Canada Global Impact+ Research Talent Initiative 🇨🇦 

Canada has launched the Global Impact+ Research Talent Initiative, a $1.7 billion package over 12 years included in Budget 2025. It consists of four programmes aimed at attracting international researchers: 

  • Canada Impact+ Research Chairs ($1 billion): supports institutions in recruiting world-leading researchers to chair positions, covering salaries and infrastructure for transformative research with pathways to application and commercialisation. 

  • Canada Impact+ Emerging Leaders ($120 million): targets international early-career researchers, with recruitment managed by host institutions under the Tri-Agency Framework on Responsible Conduct of Research. 

  • Canada Impact+ Research Infrastructure Fund ($400 million): supports world-class research infrastructure for recruited researchers. 

  • Canada Impact+ Research Training Awards ($133.6 million): enables top international doctoral and postdoctoral researchers to relocate to Canada. 

China’s long-term talent strategy for talent attraction 🇨🇳 

China’s Thousand Talents Plan, launched in 2008, initially focused on attracting Chinese researchers from the diaspora and was later expanded to include foreign researchers in 2011. Awardees receive substantial financial incentives, including an one-time 1 million yuan start-up bonus (approximately USD 140,000), eligibility for 3–5 million yuan research funding, and additional benefits such as housing, relocation, education allowances, and spousal employment support (Nature; Jia, 2018). Access to the programme requires a confirmed job offer in China. 

China is also investing in early-career talent programmes such as the Qiming Plan, which supports young researchers, often including returnees, with start-up funding, fixed-term positions, and access to research infrastructure. As implementation is largely decentralised, employment conditions and long-term career prospects vary significantly across institutions.

Choose Europe by the European Commission 🇪🇺

The European Commission’s Choose Europe initiative brings together a fragmented set of measures across existing EU instruments, with a total indicative envelope of €500 million for 2025–2027, including: 

  • MSCA Choose Europe for Science (2025): €22.5 million to support longer-term postdoctoral recruitment and address precarity. Planned 2027 call: €51.25 million. 

  • A proposed 7-year ERC “super-grant” to provide longer-term perspectives for top researchers. 

Germany’s Global Minds Initiative 🇩🇪

Germany builds on established programmes from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and the German Research Foundation, covering all career stages. Measures range from temporary fellowships to support by host institutions’ career services. Funding includes: 

  • Humboldt Research Professorships (up to €3 million over five years). 

  • Humboldt Research Fellowships for postdocs (€3,000/month) and experienced researchers (€3,600/month), with family allowances in some cases. 

  • Alexander von Humboldt Professorships (€5 million in experimental fields; €3.5 million in theoretical fields). 

However, many German research institutions are already highly internationalised (see, for example, the Max Planck PostdocNet 2024 General Survey, in which 63% of respondents were international researchers, Russell et al., 2025). For postdoctoral researchers, recent legislative developments in Germany have been particularly impactful, notably the amendment of the Academic Fixed-Term Contract Act (WissZeitVG). This reform regulates the use of temporary contracts for academic at universities and public research institutions, setting a maximum duration of six years before and six years after the PhD for fixed-term employment, which creates an uncertainty for postdocs. 

Choose France for Science 🇫🇷 

Funded by the Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR) under France 2030, Choose France for Science supports international researchers in strategic areas such as health, climate, AI, space, and energy. The scheme is co-funded, covering up to 50% of project costs, with host institutions responsible for securing the remainder. As funding is project-based, employment conditions, salary top-ups, infrastructure access, and contract duration depend entirely on host institutions, raising concerns about unequal bargaining power and long-term security for international researchers. 

Visas, mobility, and remaining barriers

Mobility decisions remain strongly influenced by visa procedures and costs for researchers and their families. Some countries are adapting visa schemes to enhance attractiveness. The UK Global Talent Visa targets highly skilled researchers with internationally recognised awards or endorsements from approved UK institutions, and proposals are under discussion to reduce or reimburse visa fees (Reuters, 2025). This contrasts with proposed sharp increases in US by Trump Administration H-1B visa applications from $215 to $100,000 for skilled foreign workers  (CNN, 2025). Portugal has also introduced a Global Talent, Highly Qualified Activity visa, allowing non-EU researchers with a job offer to relocate with family members. However, comparatively low national salary levels may limit its effectiveness without additional institutional investment. 

Open questions

As competition for talent intensifies, key questions remain: do these programmes risk reinforcing inequalities between research systems and institutions, or can they contribute to more sustainable research environments? When funding is predominantly project-based, uncertainty and precarity may persist, highlighting the need for longer-term structural solutions alongside talent-attraction initiatives.  

“I am often told that my research program is “too ambitious”. Yet ambition and risk-taking are precisely what meaningful, excellent research and creative work demand, not constant caution. The prevalence of short-term fellowships and temporary positions makes long-term academic, personal, and family planning nearly impossible. Over time, these combined conditions erode focus, momentum, and morale, and quietly push talent elsewhere. Addressing these structural constraints is therefore urgent if Germany wishes not only to attract talented researchers, but to retain them.” (X. Alvin Yang, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science)

Authors: Carolina Varela (ICoRSA), X. Alvin Yang

X. Alvin Yang is a researcher at the Lise Meitner Research Group China in the Global System of Science at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, where he also serves as Postdoctoral Representative. In 2025, he served on the Steering Group of the Max Planck PostdocNet and as Postdoctoral Representative for the Human Sciences Section of the Max Planck Society. He continues to serve as a Working Group Leader for Networking and Science Communication within the Max Planck PostdocNet. He has also been a Visiting Lecturer at Freie Universität Berlin, where he teaches research methods. 

NEWS ABOUT ICORSA

ICoRSA, together with its member organisations ANICT, Max Planck PostdocNet and NInTec, has contributed to the European Research Area - ERA Act public consultation. 

The European Research Area (ERA) Act is a proposed EU legislative initiative aimed at strengthening the governance, coherence, and implementation of the European Research Area. Building on existing ERA policies and recommendations, the Act seeks to move from largely voluntary coordination towards a more structured and effective framework, addressing persistent challenges such as fragmented research systems, uneven working conditions, barriers to researcher mobility, and disparities in research capacity across Member States. 

The joint contribution highlights the need to: 

  1. Prioritise fundamental and curiosity-driven research 

  1. Make job quality a core condition of public R&D investment 

  1. Establish EU-level protection of scientific and academic freedom 

  1. Ensure long-term and predictable widening measures 

  1. Strengthen transparency, accountability, and legislative coherence of EU research funding  

  1. Strengthen gender equality and non-discrimination within the ERA Act 

NEWS ABOUT RESEARCH ORGANISATIONS

MCAA survey on Artificial Intelligence 

The Marie Curie Alumni Association (MCAA) has launched a survey exploring how Artificial Intelligence (AI) is shaping research and innovation across the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) community, across all disciplines. Take the survey here by February 15, 2026.

Additional information can be found here. For any questions, please contact: [email protected].  

Young Academy Europe AndrĂ© Mischke YAE Prize for Science and Policy 2026 

Young Academy Europe (YAE) has opened its call for nominations for the AndrĂ© Mischke YAE Prize for Science and Policy 2026, aimed at recognising the outstanding achievements and contributions of early- and mid-career professionals in the areas of science and science policy. 

Nominations must be submitted to [email protected] by 28 February 2026. 

More about the prize here.  

NEWS IN RESEARCH AND INNOVATION POLICIES

The European Commission launches its first EU Visa Strategy  

The European Commission has launched a new EU Visa Strategy with the objective of making Europe safer, by strengthening the first line of security screening; more prosperous and competitive, by facilitating access for those who contribute to European economies and societies; more influential globally, by advancing the EU’s strategic interests, values, and international standing; and more efficient, through a smarter, more modern, and more coherent visa policy. Within this framework, the Strategy places particular emphasis on attracting global talent, including researchers and other highly skilled professionals, as a key driver of Europe’s research and innovation capacity. 

The VISA Strategy also aims at supporting the European Research Area (ERA), particularly by promoting the acceleration of procedures to facilitate international research collaboration, improving researcher mobility, and talent attraction. It builds on existing instruments such as the Researchers Directive and the EU Blue Card, while encouraging Member States to simplify procedures, reduce processing times, and better align visa frameworks with labour-market and research needs. Additionally, the EU Visa Strategy will contribute to the future ERA Act. 

For more about the EU Visa Strategy here: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_26_217  

ONGOING STUDIES ON RESEARCH CAREERS

Call for inputs Global Science Equity Survey 

Call for inputs to the Global Science Equity Survey aimed at collecting data on the global participation of researchers, with a particular focus on female researchers, to better understand equity in the international academic system through first-hand experiences.  

Deadline: 15 February 2026. 

Call for action Gender and Intersectionality experiences by researchers in Europe 

COST Action on Career Development of Early-Stage Researchers Working Group 4 (Gender Equity and Fostering Inclusiveness in European Research) is seeking experiences from R2–R3 women researchers across Europe whose lived experiences can meaningfully inform the Working Group’s work on gender equality and intersectionality. 

Researchers interested in participating in the interviews are invited to register no later than 16 February: https://framaforms.org/call-for-participation-cost-cca-working-group-on-gender-and-intersectionality-1768381239 

EVENTS

UNESCO International Day of Women and Girls in Science 

Under the theme “From vision to impact: Redefining STEM by closing the gender gap”, and building on the 2024 UNESCO Call to Action “Closing the Gender Gap in Science”, the event will highlight concrete actions and good practices that are driving more inclusive Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) ecosystems worldwide. Organized in collaboration with Femmes@NumĂ©rique, discussions will place a particular emphasis on new and emerging technologies and their role in closing the gender gap in STEM. 

Date: Wednesday, 11 February 202 from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. (CET) 

Registration in-person: https://indico.un.org/event/1021297/  

Registration online: 

ISC Women in scientific organizations:  Global evidence from science academies and unions 

To mark the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, the International Science Council, in partnership with the InterAcademy Partnership and the Standing Committee for Gender Equality in Science, will host a webinar showcasing new global evidence on women’s participation, leadership, and recognition within scientific organisations. Based on findings from the 2025 global study of scientific academies and international scientific unions, the session will examine developments over the past decade, identify areas where progress has slowed, and explore how institutional policies and practices shape participation and leadership in science. 

The webinar will take place on 11 February, from 14:00 to 16:00 UTC. Registration is available at: https://council.science/events/women-in-scientific-organizations-webinar/ 

8th ICASE World Conference on Science and Technology Education 

The 8th ICASE World Conference on Science and Technology Education will include a Marine Science Education Strand. This dedicated strand is open to marine educators, scientists, researchers, and members of the wider Ocean Literacy community, who are invited to share their work and engage in a global dialogue on strengthening human–ocean connections. The strand will also feature contributions from the internationally recognised book series Ocean Literacy: The Foundation for the Success of the Ocean Decade. 

The conference will be held from 22–25 June 2026 at University College Cork, Ireland, in collaboration with the Irish Ocean Literacy Network. 

OPPORTUNITIES

Deadline: 16 February 2026 

  • Call for applications for the Club of Rome Communications Fellowship Programme aimed at increasing the diversity of voices covering sustainability issues and supporting early-career communications professionals from Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, Middle East, and Asia-Pacific.  

Deadline: 20 February 2026. 

Call for abstracts, oral and posters submissions to the ICASE World Conference on Science and Technology Education: deadline for submission: 1 March 2026 

Deadline: 4 March 2026.