The CALIBRA project (MIS 5002799) aims at establishing the CALIBRA Phase 1, i.e., the “downscaled” CALIBRA Research Infrastructure resulting from the drastic budget cut imposed in 2016 by GSRI. As such, the CALIBRA project is the first phase towards completion of the full-scale CALIBRA Research Infrastructure.
The CALIBRA project was funded with 3,422 million Euros by the Operational Programme (OP) “Competitiveness, Entrepreneurship and Innovation 2014-2020”, with the Greek acronym ΕΠΑνΕΚ (EPAnEK). This OP is one of the seven sectoral OPs of the “Partnership Agreement (PA) for the Development Framework 2014-2020”, which is the main strategic plan for growth in Greece for the Programming Period 2014-2020 with the financial contribution from the European Structural and Investment Funds (ESIF) of the European Union. The implementation of the PA plan for 2014 – 2020, in Greek referred to as ΕΣΠΑ 2014-2020, is administered by the Ministry of Development and Investments.
The CALIBRA project proposal was submitted in Greek on 31 October 2016, within an invited call referring to the Action entitled “Support of Research Infrastructures”. It was evaluated once more by EPAnEK and was approved for funding in July 2017, however, with an (additional) budget cut of 577800 Euros. Although a well-grounded objection was formally raised against this reduction of funds, the budget was not adequately corrected and, on 27 October 2017, a ministerial decision approved the implementation of the downscaled CALIBRA RI with 3,422 million Euros.
The CALIBRA project had its kick-off meeting on 6 November 2017, but its first funding instalment was received in June 2018.