Two more Bulgarian universities joined European consortia

The Medical University of Sofia and the Agricultural University of Plovdiv joined consortia, part of the European Universities Initiative. The European Commission approved four more alliances, two of which involve Bulgarian universities. With them, the universities in Bulgaria, which are full partners in European consortia, become a total of seven, the Ministry of Education said on August 9.

The Medical University of Plovdiv joined the INGENIUM consortium, which includes nine other European universities, and the Agricultural University of Plovdiv joined UNIgreen, along with seven other universities. The university in Plovdiv is the first Bulgarian university to be a leading partner in such an alliance.

Universities from Iceland, Sweden, Finland, Ireland, Germany, Belgium, France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Poland, Romania and Greece participate in the alliance.

The consortia that are part of the network total 44. They involve 340 universities from 31 countries (all EU Member States plus Iceland, Norway, Serbia and Turkey).

It is hoped that the cooperation between universities will improve their research capacity and facilitate the teaching of integral skills and complex knowledge.

Each of the consortia receives around €14.4 million over four years under the Erasmus+ programme.