Representatives from 30 funding agencies, ministries, and multi-national organizations met in Oslo last week at the 10th plenary meeting of the Belmont Forum.  The members, partners, and guests were welcomed by Fridtjof Unander, Executive Director of the Division for Energy, Resources, and the Environment at the Research Council of Norway.  Discussion centered on flexible methods of International collaboration to advance key global change research areas.

The past three years of Belmont collaborative research actions have supported 34 multi-national projects with a total expenditure of more than 35 million Euros.  These projects have leveraged significant in kind support from experts and stakeholders worldwide and spurred new interdisciplinary partnerships among natural and social scientists.  The Forum continues to build a strong portfolio of trandisciplinary research needed to inform human action and adaptation to environmental change.

At the meeting, three organizations joined the Belmont Forum membership: the Ministry of Science and Technology of the Republic of China (MOST), the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO), and the Qatar National Research Fund (QNRF).  Their numbers grow the membership to 20 organizations and make possible new opportunities for researchers to collaborate in areas of societally-significant science.

Note: This post originally appeared on appeared on Belmont Forum Secretariat Executive Director Erica Key’s Linkedin blog.