Strengthening International Bonds

ICTP’s mission to make scientific knowledge globally available has remained the same since the Centre’s founding in 1964. As society changes and new challenges emerge, however, the ways to implement it have evolved. In 2025, ICTP Director Atish Dabholkar announced a new strategic plan, designed to enhance ICTP’s role as an international focal point for basic science research, education, cooperation, and outreach.

A key pillar of the new strategy involves the development of stronger relations with partners across the global scientific community that will help ICTP multiply its impact across the world. The International Science Alliance, a network of scientific partners with ICTP at its core, reflects a pivotal paradigmatic shift in ICTP’s approach. Acknowledging the growth of strong scientific communities in many developing regions, the Centre seeks to harness its collaborations for collective advancement through a network of national agencies, foundations and private donors, with which ICTP engages in equal collaborations.

ICTP has recently made important progress in this direction. During a two-week visit to India through the cities of Pune, Mumbai, Bengaluru, and Delhi, Dabholkar met dignitaries of key agencies and research institutes to enhance scientific cooperation. As a result of these meetings, ICTP and India’s Department of Science and Technology (DST) are now discussing ways in which ICTP and India can join forces to strengthen global scientific cooperation by establishing a formal collaborative framework.

Dabholkar’s official visit to India was also the occasion to renew existing partnerships. The collaboration between ICTP and the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay was renewed, and discussions are underway to strengthen it in research areas of common interest. A new collaboration agreement will soon be signed between ICTP and the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM) in Pune to promote the exchange of knowledge and expertise between the two institutes, particularly with the Earth System Physics section at ICTP and its group working on climate change. In this research area, ICTP has recently announced a project led by ICTP and the InterAcademy Partnership (IAP) to support the work of early-career climate scientists from developing countries and countries with economies in transition as contributing authors of the IPCC’s Seventh Assessment Report. Six out of the 57 scientists selected for project, which is funded by the UK’s Wellcome Trust, are from India.

ICTP is also strengthening collaborations with its close neighbours. In an official visit to ICTP in March 2026, Hon. Igor Papic, Slovenian Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation, signed a Memorandum of Understanding to strengthen scientific cooperation and promote collaboration between ICTP’s global scientific network and the Slovenian scientific community. ICTP also signed a collaboration agreement to exchange knowledge, establish collaborative programs, and support capacity building initiatives with the Romanian National Authority for Scientific Research (ANC) during the visit of its president, Mr. Alexei Alexandru, and of Ms. Letiția Pavelescu, Senior Official of the Ministry of Research, Innovation, and Digitalization of Romania. 

The initiatives with India, and the new partnerships with Slovenia and Romania, are the latest in a series of collaboration agreements that ICTP has been forging over the past six years with ministries and agencies in several countries, including Brazil and South Africa, and with major foundations such as the Kuwait Fund for the Advancement of Science, the Simons Foundation, the Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development, and the Wilhelm and Else Heraeus Foundation. “By formalising and strengthening ICTP’s network of partners worldwide, the International Science Alliance will provide a coordinated framework for collaborative activities, distributed programmes, shared resources and mutual support. This will ultimately improve accessibility to science, and we are grateful to our current partners in India, Slovenia and Romania for joining us in our efforts to promote scientific cooperation globally,” said Dabholkar.