OPTIONS for strengthening interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary collaborative research : Concluding report: summary

Global Change Research and Sustainability Research in Germany have blossomed
largely because of the funding policy of the BMBF. The Research for Sustainability
(FONA) framework programme illustrates the diversity and complexity of the topics
which are now being covered by the BMBF funding policy on both the national and the
international level. Collaborative projects with an interdisciplinary or transdisciplinary
orientation2 are the conceptual cornerstones of this funding. Projects of this type
involve additional challenges compared to disciplinary research.