Republic of North Macedonia

Republic of North Macedonia

Overview

Mandated Organisation

University Ss Cyril and Methodius in Skopje, Faculty of Computer Science and Engineering (FCSE-UKIM)

EOSC Steering Board representatives

Republic of North Macedonia recognises the importance of Open Science policies and practices. In that context, North Macedonia nominated members in the EOSC Governance Board in 2020. With the establishment of the EOSC Association, University Ss. Cyril and Methodious (UKIM), Faculty of Computer Science and Engineering (FCSE) has become a full member. The Government has nominated representatives in the EOSC Steering Board.

Within the framework of the project National Initiatives for Open Science – Europe (NI4OS-Europe), in 2021 the National Open Science Cloud initiative – NOSCI.mk was established. The NOSCI.mk started with the individual support of around 100 scientist and researchers from the country who signed the declaration to support NOSCI.mk.

During 2022, UKIM, represented by FCSE, the only country member of the EOSC Association, signed an MoU for institutional support to the NOSCI.mk with all the state universities and the national research and education network MARNET.

The MoU is currently being signed with more research institutions, private universities and other interested parties. The recently adopted Roadmap on Research Infrastructures recognises the importance of EOSC and recommends the development of national infrastructures compatible to EOSC.

In 2021, the Ministry of Education and Science provided support for the development of the National Open Science Laboratory. UKIM, FCSE was awarded 70% funding from the Ministry  to procure the equipment to establish the National Open Science Laboratory.

NOSCI.mk

The National Open Science Initiative in the Cloud aims to build a partnership with the Ministry of Education and Science to contribute to the development and upgrading of national legislation and the incorporation of the principles of Open Science in it.

Individual researchers sign a declaration to join NOSCI.mk. The purpose of this Joint Declaration is to support and emphasise openness as a fundamental value for raising the quality of research and the autonomy of researchers. Principles and practices for promoting openness offer space for the development of science and researchers in an independent way. Independent research communities can thus be more closely linked to the rest of society and influence its development. This Declaration on Open Science Cloud Research is open to all stakeholders belonging to the research community in the country to promote openness at the national level. By accepting the Declaration of Open Science and Research, members of the research community of North Macedonia express their individual or institutional interest in promoting the goals of Open Science in their organisation and participating in the dissemination of those principles at the national level.

Institutional support is performed through singing MoUs on Open Science between UKIM and the interested organisations.

Policies

There are no specific Open Science policies at the country level. Some initiatives are being introduced, such as:

  • Support for funding of researchers for publications with IF is provisioned by publication of the papers in the institutional repository and maintenance of CRIS profile.
  • All scientific laboratories procured with co-funding from the Ministry need to have Open Access policies

Within the RCC supported project on the establishment of the Western Balkan Open Access Research Infrastructure, several institutions have adopted their Open Access policies