Call for Research Proposals 2025-2027

ESA EO AFRICA R&D Facility, in collaboration with the African Union Commission (AUC), announces:

Call for Research Proposals 2025-2027

The main focus of this call is to leverage Earth observation to tackle present and future challenges in water and food security for Africa.

Introduction

EO AFRICA is an African-EU Framework for Research, Innovation, Communities, and Applications to foster an African-European R&D partnership facilitating the sustainable adoption of Earth Observation and related space technologies in Africa. The ESA initiative has a long-term (>10 years) vision with an African user-driven approach in a collaborative partnership with the African Union Commission (AUC) and its operational GMES & Africa initiative, taking into account requirements and capacities from African regional centres and programmes.

EO AFRICA R&D Facility is the flagship initiative of ESA EO AFRICA with overarching goals of enabling an active research community and promoting creative innovation processes for the continuous development of African EO capabilities. To facilitate modern research workflows that take advantage of cloud satellite archives and are shareable and reproducible, the Facility sets up cloud computing environments for the researchers (Innovation Lab). The facility supports African–European research tandems and delivers a range of collaborative capacity development activities (Space Academy) and initiatives between the African and European research communities based on a comprehensive review of African EO research challenges.

Objective

In collaboration with the AUC, the ESA EO AFRICA R&D Facility launches a call for research proposals to support African–European collaborative efforts to develop innovative and reusable open-source EO algorithms and applications adapted to African solutions to African challenges by leveraging cutting-edge cloud-based data access and computing infrastructure. This is the second call of the second phase of the EO AFRICA R&D Facility. More information on the earlier calls and awarded research projects are available on the web portal.

Call for Research Proposals

The ESA EO AFRICA R&D Facility, in collaboration with AUC, will support up to 10 (ten) research proposals for 15-month projects, commencing on 1^st of September 2025 as follows:

Research Topics

Water and food are the main themes of the EO AFRICA R&D Facility’s Research Calls. The present call aims at addressing research topics related to leveraging Earth Observation data to tackle present and future challenges in water and food security for Africa. Proposals in the following topics are encouraged to apply:

EO contributions, using various techniques such as e.g. optical and hyperspectral remote sensing, Polarimetric and SAR to study and monitor:

Marine and coastal resources
Regional evapotranspiration and hydrological stresses
Hydrological extremes and induced hazards such as droughts and floods

Crop development, yield forecast, precision farming and irrigation demand
Lakes and rivers dynamics
Water and air quality
Forest and rangeland processes

Application Criteria

Project proposals shall meet the following criteria:

The project must be proposed by two scientists representing a collaborative partnership of one African and one European research entity (e.g., institute, laboratory, university) from a country which is an ESA Member state or cooperating state.
The co-principal investigators should possess a PhD degree relevant to the topics of the call or be in the process of obtaining it as a PhD candidate.
Project teams may include more researchers.
Projects should be completed within 15 months.
Project proposals should focus on one or more of the research topics of the call.
Each proposal is expected to contain a research plan for the scientific cooperation of the African and European partners to develop an innovative and open-source EO algorithm/ workflow (e.g., as set of Jupyter Notebooks hosted on a public git-enabled platform, for example here ).
The proposal should explain how the work will be shared among the partners, including the roles of project team members and their expected contributions.
The proposed research can be linked to the partners’ ongoing (collaborative) project. In that case, the proposal should clearly delineate the proposed activities from those of the ongoing research project.
Research plan should be accompanied by a detailed budget, including anticipated cost items related to the research project, and its distribution between the African and European partner organizations.
The proposed budget cannot include ICT resources for computing purposes (e.g., servers, HPC budgets), as such resources will be provided by the Network of Resources of the ESA separately
Budget should be reserved to participate in the following 2 events:
1. At least one person from the African partner in the research projects should join the Face-2-Face course on Cloud Computing and Algorithms for EO Analyses planned in Tunis 17-21 November 2025 (date and place to be confirmed)
2. In addition, we request at least 2 persons (one from the African and one from the European side) to participate in an EO AFRICA RDF event planned to take place in April 2026 in Dar es Salaam (tbc)
Both partners have equal rights on the budget, so its allocation must be decided in a full agreement. Nevertheless, due to the governing regulations, the European partner is responsible for administering the entire project budget. This includes invoicing EO AFRICA R&D Facility on behalf of the research tandem and consequently takes care of handling costs and payments to the African partner.
The Innovation Lab of the EO AFRICA R&D Facility should be used for the development and execution of the algorithm/workflow and auxiliary project activities. Commercial use of the resources or executing activities not related to the project are not allowed.
The developed algorithm/workflow should utilise EO data from ESA missions, such as Sentinel. Third-party data can also be utilised. The use of analysis-ready data and EO data services is encouraged.
In case one of the outputs of the project is a dataset, it must follow the attached guidelines on publishing cloud-native datasets.
The developed algorithm/workflow and its application in the thematic context of the call shall be published at least in one international conference proceeding or in an open-access peer-reviewed journal. Open-access publications are supported by the Facility from an additional fund. Thus open-access publication costs should not be included in the budget.

Funding and Benefits

The EO AFRICA R&D Facility will provide the selected projects with:

A budget of up to 30,000 EUR to cover research activities during the project period (max. 15 months), such as personnel costs, fieldwork, data collection, bilateral visits, scientific meetings, training activities, etc.
Free access to cloud-based Virtual Research Environments (VREs) through the Innovation Lab of the Facility, an interactive geospatial computing platform with ready-to-use EO software, and facilitated access to EO data (e.g., Sentinel and other ESA missions) through the host DIAS infrastructure. See Appendix for more information on VREs.
Dedicated user and technical support for using VREs and developing geospatial computing workflows.
Scientific support and advice and advice by senior researchers and experts of the EO AFRICA R&D Facility consortium.
Access to the EO AFRICA Space Academy and its Digital Campus for capacity and knowledge development activities, such as online courses, webinars, and face-to-face training events on topics related to EO, cloud computing, food security, and water scarcity.
Integration into the EO AFRICA Community for international scientific networking, collaboration, and visibility.

Proposal Submission

The call is announced on 14^th of April 2025 and will be open for submission for 8 (eight) weeks. The deadline for submitting a full proposal is 15^th of June 2025, 23:59 CET.

The proposal submission shall include:

Research proposal fully completed in all parts according to the provided template (English or French), duly signed by the African and the European Co-PIs and authorised representatives of the African and European research institutions (same persons who would eventually sign a collaborative Agreement on behalf of the partner institution),
Detailed CV of the African co-principal investigator,
Detailed CV of the European co-principal investigator,
Short resumes of other researchers of the team.

The following items are optional and will be considered as assets:

Support letter(s) from the beneficiaries,
Any other relevant document.

Proposal teams can submit through the following form. The proposal document itself shall be a single signed PDF document containing all supportive documents (e.g., CVs, support letters):

Any further inquiries can be made through the EO AFRICA R&D Facility via e-mail to: research@eoafrica-rd.org.

Expected Deliverables

Deliverable	Deadline
Progress report including materials for public dissemination and the African event	KO + 7 months
Final report (including materials for public dissemination through the website)	KO + 15 months
Open-source research code and data repository, including a demonstration workflow/visualization	KO + 15 months
Open-access peer-reviewed scientific publication (draft or submitted)	KO + 15 months

Evaluation

An expert committee will evaluate proposals with members delegated by ESA, AUC, and EO AFRICA R&D Facility. The following criteria will be considered:

Level of innovation of the EO application with relevance to the topics of the call
Addressing the specific needs in Africa
Scientific soundness and maturity
Making innovative use of modern cloud computing facilities
The availability of a sound open science strategy
Impact for fostering the use of EO data and services in Africa
Balanced cooperation of the partners
Background of the African and European co-principal investigators
Geographic representation of Africa

The applicants will be informed about the result of the selection in an e-mail, and the list of awarded projects will be published on the EO AFRICA R&D website in August 2025.

The scientific content and the budget distribution for each selected project will be finalised in agreement with the EO AFRICA R&D Facility. After authorisation by ESA, a tri-lateral collaboration agreement will be signed between the EO AFRICA R&D Facility and the African and European institutions of each selected project. The applicants are requested to review the example collaboration agreement before submission of their proposals to prevent any potential conflict at a later stage. Questions on the collaboration agreement can be directed to research@eoafrica-rd.org. The projects will start following an online Kick-off Workshop on 1^st of September 2025.

Relevant Links

EO AFRICA website: https://eo4society.esa.int/eo-africa/
EO AFRICA R&D website: https://www.eoafrica-rd.org/
EO AFRICA R&D research projects: https://www.eoafrica-rd.org/research/

Important Dates

Open Call	14 April 2025
Submission of Proposals	15 June 2025 23:59 CET
Communication of Selection Results	August 2025
Start of projects	1 September 2025
Kick-off Workshop	1 September 2025

Contact

Any questions relating to the call should be sent by e-mail to research@eoafrica-rd.org, no later than 2 (two) working days before the submission deadline.

Appendix

Virtual Research Environments (VREs)

Each research team will have access to one or more VREs with the following features:

4 vCPU with Intel x86-64 architecture
32 GB RAM
100 GB SSD local storage for temporary storage
SSD network storage for permanent storage (min. 1 TB)
Direct network access to EO Data is available on the host DIAS platform.
JupyterLab interface with terminal and remote desktop access
Pre-installed scientific computing, EO data analysis, and machine learning packages for accessing EO data services, developing EO algorithms and workflows, and visualising results in interactive notebooks (e.g., Python and R packages)
Pre-installed scientific and EO desktop software for pre-processing and other needs (e.g., SNAP, QGIS, Visual Code, RStudio, etc.)

GPU-enabled VREs with the following features will be available for specific needs, which are explicitly indicated and justified in the proposal and quantified in terms of hours necessary. Please note that the facility expects the teams to exploit normal VREs for data pre-processing, model building and testing on a subset of the dataset; the GPU-enabled VREs will only be used at the end to run the developed model on the whole dataset. The GPU-enabled VREs will have the following features.

12 vCPU with Intel x86-64 architecture
117 GB RAM
128 GB SSD local storage for temporary storage
SSD network storage for permanent storage (min. 1 TB)
Direct network access to EO Data available on the host host DIAS platform.
JupyterLab interface with terminal and remote desktop access
Pre-installed scientific computing, EO data analysis, and machine learning packages for accessing EO data services, developing GPU-accelerated EO algorithms and workflows, and visualising results in interactive notebooks (e.g., Python and R packages)
Pre-installed scientific and EO desktop software for pre-processing and other needs (e.g., SNAP, QGIS, Visual Code, RStudio, etc.)

Frequently Asked Questions

Proposal

Can an independent researcher participate in the project?: An independent researcher cannot be a Co-PI because a Co-PI should be affiliated to a research entity. However, she/he can be a team member.
Is a private research company regarded as a research entity?: Yes, research companies are regarded as research entities.
Is a ministry (e.g., Ministry of Agriculture) regarded as a research entity?: It is accepted, if Co-PI with a PhD and proven scientific track is working for the ministry.
Should the number of researchers from Africa and Europe be equal in the project team?: Equal number of researchers will be appreciated, but it is not a requirement.
Is an institution from Norway is eligible to participate in the call?: Yes, Norway is eligible because it is an ESA member.
Is an institution from U.K. is eligible to participate in the call?: Yes, U.K. is eligible because it is an ESA member.
Is an institution from Turkey is eligible to participate in the call?: Yes, Turkey is eligible because it has a cooperation agreement with ESA.
Can a co-PI be affiliated with the research entity only partially during the project (e.g., first 3 months)?: No, a Co-PI should be affiliated with the related institution during the whole project period. In case of unforeseen circumstances, it might be possible to replace a Co-PI with another eligible person from the same institution, as the contract will be signed with the institution but not the Co-PI. But there should be a strong reason for that (e.g., illness, etc.).
Is there a limit in the number of researchers in the project team?: There is no maximum limit in the number of researchers. The minimum number is 2, i.e. one African co-PI and one European co-PI.
Can a researcher submit more than one proposal?: Number of proposals submitted is not an evaluation criterion. However, we don’t suggest this practice, because it is not in line with the policy of diversity (e.g., geographic representation in Africa), which is an evaluation criterion.
Is public sharing of the research outputs an absolute condition for funding?: Yes, the outputs of the research, including research code, data, reports, and articles should be made publicly available.
Can the workflows/algorithms developed during the project made available to end-users (e.g. farmers, policy-makers, etc.) at the end of the project?: The algorithms developed during the project should be open source and publicly available. There is no restriction to use them later, e.g., in an app that can be used by the farmers.
Should the proposal be limited to one country as a study area?: No, there is no limitation on the study area. You can propose a research project from local to continental scale.
Who can be an authorized representative?: An authorized representative is a person who can officially confirm institutional support to the proposal, including approval of the designated work and contribution of the Co-PI and other team members from the organization.
Can an authorized representative of the research entity be a co-PI?: Yes.
Can an authorized representative of the research entity be a project team member?: Yes.

Budget

Is 30,000 EUR budget total or for each partner?: 30,000 EUR budget is total, i.e., should cover the activities of both partners.
Are there any provisions for the costs that will be covered by the project budget (i.e., 30,000 EUR)?: 30,000 EUR budget should include all costs related to the research activity. If an audit is requested by ESA, the project partners should be able to prove the costs. As indicated in the call, the cost of computing resources will be covered separately.
Should we prepare a financial certification at the end of the project?: Planned budget items/amounts will be agreed before the tri-lateral agreement is signed. An invoice with a financial statement about the totals of the budget items will be needed. The proofs should be kept so the costs could be proved for an audit, but only if it is requested by ESA.
What will be the approval regulations, including financial rules?: There will be a subcontract between the European partner institution and ITC. Dutch law will be the governing law for the subcontract.
Can the African partner (i.e., research institution) be a subcontractor of the project?: African partners are expected to be fully integrated to the projects as research partners, not subcontractors.
Is it possible to fund participation to a conference after the completion of the project (i.e. after 15 months)?: Yes, it is possible if it is indicated in the proposal. The terms of the budget allocation will be discussed in detail and finalized during the kick-off meeting. This can be agreed during the kick-off meeting.

Submission

Can we submit multiple PDF files (e.g., proposal + CVs)?: You should submit a single PDF file containing the proposal and all other supportive documents, including CVs. Please contact us if you encounter technical difficulties in merging multiple files.