What must I submit?

If you have a project idea or grant application matching one of the ongoing calls, you can submit it via the ‘My ZonMw’ digital desk. In addition to completing the application form, we ask you to add a number of documents, such as a detailed project budget and the Statement of agreement concerning submission of a detailed grant application.

An ongoing call for grant applications contains a link to ‘My ZonMw’. Click the link to go to the summary page of ongoing calls for grant applications. You can select the application form for the call there.

You can add your Statement of agreement to your detailed grant application directly via ‘My ZonMw'. Or you can send the Statement by e-mail one week after submitting your grant application at the latest. Send your e-mail to the relevant programme secretariats as specified in the call for grant applications.

By signing the Statement of agreement, the person bearing administrative responsibility and the primary applicant agree to submission of the grant application. They must both sign this document.

In the project budget, you must describe how much funding you believe you will need for the elements personnel, materials, implementation costs, miscellaneous costs, and third-party contributions. The call for grant applications specifies the required budget format. If this is not specified in the call, use the format most suitable for your organisation.

Costs of the audit opinion

Audit costs up to a maximum of €3,500 may be included in the budget of projects costing €125,000 or more. Because of changes to ZonMw’s General Grant Provisions effective from 1 April 2022, you must submit an audit opinion in addition to the final financial report on completion of a project costing €125,000 or more.

Universities and university medical centres are not permitted to include auditor’s costs in the budget. Separate arrangements have been made with these institutions concerning the audit opinion required. Please contact your finance department for further information.

Open Access publication costs

Open Access publication has been a ZonMw requirement since 1 January 2021. Open Access aims to make publicly funded research available online to all. Costs for Open Access publication may be included in the project budget. The maximum permitted budget amount is specified in the call text. Include ‘Open Access’ as a separate item in your budget.

Value-added tax

No value-added tax (‘BTW’ in Dutch) is charged on grants provided by ZonMw. The projects funded by ZonMw serve the public interest and ZonMw is not a ‘service user’ with regard to the services provided by the grant recipient. You will not have to pay VAT on the grant you receive, in other words.

If, as a grant recipient, you use the grant to procure goods or services, you pay VAT for these goods or services. If you cannot deduct the paid VAT in your VAT declaration, you are allowed to specify it as project costs within the scope of the approved maximum grant sum.

Certain projects require a medical ethical review of research (medicines research, research on medical devices and other medical research) or a project licence from the Central Authority for Scientific Procedures on Animals (CCD). According to our grant provisions, a project that requires this cannot start including subjects or laboratory animals without a copy of approval or the licence. You can include costs for the medical ethical review of research or a Central Authority for Scientific Procedures on Animals (CCD) licence in the budget. You will need to account for the actual costs incurred in the final statement of the project based on underlying invoices.

Field standard

If your research concerns health care evaluation that is subject to the WMO (Medical Research Involving Human Subjects Act), then we would like to draw your attention to the Field standard. The Field standard intends, within the frameworks of legislation such as the WMO, CTR (Clinical Trial Regulation) and MDR (Medical Device Regulation), to ensure a uniform and proportional framework for the assessment and quality of health care evaluations, and thus to promote the quicker start and easier implementation of health care evaluations. Additional information on the assessment and quality assurance of the Field standard can be found here.

• Rates for application of project licence for animal experiments.
• Rates for review medicines research and research on medical devices.
• Separate rates apply for the review of other medical research in the Netherlands. These rates differ per approved Medical Ethics Review Board.
• More information about review procedure for medical research with human subjects.

The following has been stipulated on the bench fee in the contract with the VSNU:

• A personal bench fee of €5,000 is provided to PhD students (assuming a four-year position) and senior scientific assistants (assuming a two-year position). The minimum is two years. When PhD students are appointed for a period exceeding two years, the full bench fee is granted.
  This arrangement also applies to three-year PhD students who already did PhD work in their Master’s stage.
• The NWO Talent programme (Veni, Vidi and Vici) deviates from this scheme. You cannot include a bench fee in your budget for this programme.
• The bench fee is intended for PhD expenses and congress attendance (abroad). The bench fee is intended for the party executing the project but made available to the project leader. As such, the party executing the project is entitled to it. Use of the bench fee must be discussed by the project leader and the party executing the project. For PhD students, the bench fee includes an allowance for printing the dissertation. As a result, PhD students in this project type are no longer entitled to separate allowances for having their dissertation printed. However, the project leader/party executing the project may use the bench fee at their discretion.

Approval of funding for scientific research 2008 lays down mutual obligations with regard to the individuals employed by institutions for projects funded by ZonMw. You can find the salary tables for personnel of university institutions and university medical centres. These salary tables determine the scope of the personnel costs that can be budgeted for a ZonMw grant. These tables are based on the CLA of Dutch universities and the CLA for university medical centres, respectively.