The UK-China Researcher Links Workshop is run as part of the Newton Fund (known in China as the UK-China Joint Research and Innovation Partnership Fund). The programme is delivered by the British Council China and the National Natural Science Foundation of China. Researcher Links Workshops bring together early-career researchers from the UK and a partner country to make international connections that can improve the quality of their research. Applications are made on a bi-lateral basis by senior researchers. Once funded, grants are available for early-career researchers in the UK and the country hosting the workshop to attend.

The Newton Fund aims to promote the economic development and welfare of either the partner countries or, through working with the partner country, to address the problems of low-income and vulnerable populations around the world. As such all applications must be in the priority areas and meet the ODA requirements.

Priority Areas:  Applications must fall into one or more of the supported key fields. Multidisciplinary proposals are welcome. The key supported fields are as follows:

• Health/life sciences 
• Environmental technologies 
• Food and water security
• Energy
• Urbanisation

ODA requirement: All applications must meet the required relevance levels in economic development or social welfare (see the Guidelines for further information) of the partner country. 

In the previous call for proposals as part of the Researcher Links Workshops we funded 53% of eligible applications.

Eligibility Criteria

• Leading Researchers, as defined by the EC, can apply for these workshop grants in order to be workshop coordinators.
• Each proposal must have one workshop coordinator (Leading Researcher) from the UK, and one from China.  
• Please see list of eligible UK research institutions in the Downloads section.
• Other eligibility criteria apply. Please refer to the Guidelines document, available from the Downloads section below for full eligibility criteria.