serbia

Serbia’s scientists rise to defend access to papers

Posted 16 April 2013 by Mićo Tatalović

In just three days more than 3,000 of Serbia's scientists have signed a petition aimed at the Serbian Government and Ministry of Science to preserve access to journals thorough a Serbian library service KoBSON, following loss of access to Oxford University Press materials earlier this month (9 April). The service first announced its funding woes last December, when most databases and publishers gave it three months' grace period. Yet the government did not provide the funding in time, which led... Read more

Posted in Journals, Serbia |

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How do Western Balkan countries fare with EU research grants?

Posted 5 March 2013 by Mićo Tatalović

In 2011, Slovenia received the largest number of EU research grants of any Western Balkan country, with 98 projects worth a total of €32,401,000 (Turkey was just ahead of it with 158 projects worth €36,685,000). Most of these grants went to the Jožef Stefan Institute, the National Institute of Biology, and the University of Ljubljana and most of the projects’ partners were based in Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy, Spain and France. None of the Slovenian institutions ranked in the... Read more

Posted in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Science funding, Serbia, Slovenia |

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Soul-searching at Serbia’s Vinča institute as it looks for new director, vision and reforms

Posted 4 March 2013 by Mićo Tatalović

One of Serbia's largest and most renowned research bodies, the Vinča Institute of Nuclear Sciences, has re-launched its long-running quest for radical reform in its management and of its purpose in this troubled society. Since its foundation in 1948 Vinča has been carrying out research on a range of topics from nuclear and atomic physics to environmental protection. The institute, and one of its now defunct research reactors, was built with Russian assistance during the Cold War: some speculated that... Read more

Posted in Serbia |

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Access to scientific papers at risk for Serbia’s researchers

Posted 24 January 2013 by Mićo Tatalović

Researchers in Serbia are facing reduced access to scientific literature after funding cuts to the national portal KoBSON, run by a consortium of some of its largest libraries, which has become the main access point for research institutions over the past 11 years of its existence. Instead of New Year's greetings, KoBSON, which is financed solely though the state budget, announced its problems publicly on 27 December, in response to concern from users over the previous few months. In the... Read more

Posted in Journals, Serbia |

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Funding for Vojvodina’s science academy under threat

Posted 19 December 2012 by Mićo Tatalović

Vojvodina’s science academy, VANU, has published a letter to the public, both Serbian and international, calling on them to defend its existence as a regional academy dealing with issues that are neglected on the national level. This regional academy is in danger of being shut down for the second time since it was established as part of a decentralisation drive of the former Yugoslavia in 1979. When the Balkan wars began, VANU was closed in 1992 (together with Kosovo's science... Read more

Posted in Science academies, Science policy, Vojvodina |

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Serbian scientists decry systematic plagiarism, predatory publishing

Posted 17 December 2012 by Mićo Tatalović

An open letter to the Serbian science ministry – coinciding with the new government’s first 100 days in office – and an accompanying petition signed by 850 scientists so far, makes for pretty dim reading on the state of research ethics in Serbia. The systematic and apparently state-endorsed practice of artificially boosting one’s ratings in the national evaluation system, which drives promotions and helps set salaries, has led to a range of abuses that are promoting mediocrity while driving scientific talent out of the... Read more

Posted in Journals, Serbia |

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Revealed: details of the World Bank draft strategy for Western Balkans’ science

Posted 2 December 2012 by Mićo Tatalović

Four years in the making, the World Bank-led project responding to the Western Balkans science ministers' 2009 plea for aid to integrate their countries' scientific efforts is expected soon to result in concrete new research funds, networks of excellence, technology transfer and research evaluation bodies. The latest draft of the project's strategy, dated November 2012 and presented at a UNESCO-sponsored expert meeting in Sarajevo, has "five major lines" which will be discussed with national governments over the next two months,... Read more

Posted in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Regional collaboration, Science funding, Science policy |

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Scientists petition Serbian government to tackle misconduct

Posted 10 November 2012 by Mićo Tatalović

More than 800 scientists have signed a petition started two weeks ago campaigning for an overhaul of research ethics and the assessment process for researchers in Serbia, amid systematic and widely-tolerated academic misconduct. An open letter has also been sent to the science and education ministry. The letter details a damning situation of research and publication misconduct, including widespread plagiarism, self-plagiarism and duplication of papers; the formation of ‘citation cartels’ where friends’ names are added as co-authors on papers; and artificially upping the... Read more

Posted in Journals, Science policy, Serbia, Vojvodina |

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EC finds mixed progress, and some setbacks, in research in South-East Europe

Posted 17 October 2012 by Mićo Tatalović

Research and development systems in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina (BIH), Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Serbia, and Turkey were among the issues put under the spotlight in a series of reports on states' preparedness of those nations for EU membership, published by European Commission last week (10 October). The EC adopted its 'Enlargement package' - a set of documents explaining its policy on EU enlargement and reporting on progress achieved over the past year in each candidate or potential candidate country. The... Read more

Posted in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, Science funding, Science policy, Serbia |

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Serbia’s court says Vojvodina’s right to make its own science decisions is unconstitutional

Posted 31 July 2012 by Mićo Tatalović

In what some have called a throwback to the time when strongman Slobodan Milošević was president of Serbia, the Serbian constitutional court has this month (10 July) struck down a lot of a 2009 law that had granted Vojvodina, the country's northern region which is dominated by ethnic Hungarians rather than Serbs, autonomy over many of its affairs, such as fisheries, social care, and forestry. This included the right to govern its own science, including funding a science academy, in... Read more

Posted in Serbia, Vojvodina |

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