Leading House MENA

The Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI) commissioned the HES⁠-⁠SO as the Leading House (LH) for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. The mandate will last from 2017 to 2020 and its overall goal is to develop scientific collaborations between Switzerland and countries of the MENA region.

The Leading House MENA has set three strategic goals

• Further development of the research cooperation between Switzerland and countries with a high development potential in the above mentioned region with funding instruments designed according to the interests of the Swiss research community
• Increase of knowledge on countries with a high development potential among the Swiss research community through the availability of contacts and know how
• Representation of the interests of the Swiss research community towards potential partners in the region.

Evaluation of SERI's bilateral cooperation programmes

In 2019, SERI mandated the Danish consulting compangy IRIS Group to run a complete evaluation of its bilateral cooperation programmes, which the Leading House MENA is part of. The evaluation report, available on SERI's website, gives an overview of existing instruments and of improvements that can be made in the future.

Swiss Leading Houses for other regions

• East and South East Asia: ETH Zurich
• Latin America: University of St Gallen
• Russia and CIS: University of Geneva
• South Asia and Iran: ZHAW Zurich University of Applied Sciences
• Sub-Saharan Africa: Swiss TPH