The Netherlands Fellowship Programmes (NFP)

The Netherlands Fellowship Programmes (NFP) are demand oriented fellowship programmes designed to foster institutional development. The NFP is initiated and fully funded by the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs from the budget for development cooperation. This ministry has contracted the Netherlands organization for international cooperation in higher education (Nuffic) to administer the NFP.

The overall aim of the NFP is to help alleviate qualitative and quantitative shortages of skilled manpower and to do so within the framework of sustainable capacity-building directed towards reducing poverty in developing countries.

More specifically, the NFP is focused on meeting the need for further training and capacity-building in developing countries. To maximize the fellowships’ impact on capacity-building, NFP funded training must be linked to the institutional development of organizations. A wide range of organizations are eligible — governmental, private and non-governmental. They can include educational institutions, planning agencies, ministries, community-based organizations, and private enterprises, for example.

The NFP target group consists of mid-career professionals who are already in employment and who are nationals of or working in one of 57 selected countries. While fellowships are awarded to individuals, the need for training must occur within the context of the organization for which an applicant works. The training must
help the organization to develop its capacity. This means that applicants must be nominated by their employers. In fact, an application without the support of an employer will not be considered. Half of the available funding from the NFP budget should be spent on fellowships for female candidates and for candidates from sub-Saharan Africa.

For mid-career professionals from organizations in developing countries, the NFP offers the following options:
· Tailor-made training courses
· Fellowships for PhD studies
· Refresher courses
· Fellowships for short courses
· Fellowships for master’s degree programmes

For the PhD studies, short courses and master’s degree programmes, NFP uses a two-step application procedure. Applicants must first gain admission to the course or programme they have chosen, and only then they can apply for a fellowship through a Netherlands embassy or consulate. The appropriate fellowship application forms are available at the Netherlands embassies and consulates or can be downloaded from this website.

To gain admission to a course or programme, an applicant has to contact the relevant institution directly. The required information can be found on the institutions’ websites.

The lists of the master’s degree programmes and the lists of short courses are the result of a survey of the Dutch post-secondary education sector conducted at the beginning of 2005. Providers whose courses were not accepted for inclusion in the list are able to appeal against Nuffic’s decision, which means that at a later date a number of courses might be added to the list. If this occurs, Nuffic will immediately update the website version of the course list and will distribute addenda that can be enclosed with the printed publication. Therefore, interested individuals are advised to check the aforementioned websites regularly.

In addition to the Netherlands Fellowship Programmes, the Dutch foreign ministry also funds a programme for international cooperation focused on institution-building. This is the Netherlands Programme for Institutional Strengthening of Post-Secondary Education and Training Capacity (NPT). Its aim is to help developing countries increase their capacity for providing post-secondary education and training, and to do so in a sustainable manner.

Source: http://www.nuffic.nl/nfp/