Call for expression of interest to host permanent secretariat of Future Earth

The Science and Technology Alliance for Global Sustainability is launching an open competitive process for the selection of a permanent secretariat for Future Earth, a 10-year international research programme dedicated to generating new knowledge for challenges posed by global environmental change and transitions towards global sustainability. The call is being managed by the International Council for Science (ICSU).

The successful bid will host a permanent secretariat – which should comprise a headquarters and regional nodes – for the 10-year research programme. The Secretariat will coordinate research activities, handle the day-to-day management of Future Earth, and liaise with key stakeholders.

Interested parties (whether individual organisations or consortia of organisations) are invited at this stage to express their interest by reviewing the briefing document and completing a template. Following this first step (expression of interest), a bidders’ conference (step 2) will be organised to discuss the requirements further and enable bidders to meet with other potential bidders so that they can self-organize for the call for full proposals (step 3) where bidders are expected to submit full proposals (comprising a headquarters and regional nodes, with secured funding). The Future Earth secretariat is expected to be appointed in mid-2014 and be fully operational by the end of 2014.

All expressions of interest should be submitted not later than 23 September 2013.