Dr. Khaled Abdel Ghaffar, Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research, approved the result of the unified announcement of the missions’ plan for the fourth year 2020/2021 of the eighth five-year plan 2017/2022, which includes dispatching (external missions - joint supervision - masters - post-doctoral scientific missions), in partnership with the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA)

The minister indicated that 424 male and female researchers from various universities, institutes and research centers applied for the announcement, and 356 male and female researchers fulfilled the conditions. The types of delegation are distributed as follows: (73 external missions, 31 joint supervisions, 147 post-doctoral scientific missions, 7 master’s scholarships), and the share of female researchers was approximately 36% of the total researchers for this year.

The minister added that the accredited missions included the most prestigious universities and research institutes in 31 countries, led by the United Kingdom, with 58 missions, followed by 51 missions for the United States of America, 26 missions for Japan and 20 missions for Canada, and the list included universities with distinguished international classification such as (MIT University - Stanford University - Harvard University - University of London - Turin - University of Michigan, and other prestigious universities).

The minister indicated that the number of scholarships granted to students in the medical sector reached 120, which represents about half of the total number, in addition to 38 missions in the field of agriculture and food security, and 17 missions in the field of new and renewable energy, in addition to a number of missions in many axes. Studies such as (water - environment - strategic industry techniques - information and communication technology and space - education and learning development - investment, trade and transport - social and human sciences).

It is worth noting that Assiut University came at the forefront of universities that received a number of scholarships, with 31 scholarships, Tanta University received 24 scholarships, Mansoura University 22 scholarships, Ain Shams University 21 scholarships, and Cairo University 17 scholarships.