LISBON: The Portuguese government has approved a law to encourage creation of scientific jobs, which includes offering contracts to researchers who hold a PhD, replacing a previous scheme that offered post-doctorate grants.
In a statement, the Portuguese cabinet said the law, “favours hiring younger researchers” and is intended to attract and keep hold of “qualified human resources” as well as to bring new blood to “entities that are part of the national scientific and technological system”. The new law requires jobs to be opened for PhD holders at state, or state-funded, institutions where there have been post-doctoral researchers on grants for over three years.
During the negotiation phase the new law was criticised, by university lecturers and researcher unions and by the Association of Scientific Research Scholars, for including fixed-term contracts rather than more stable contractual positions.
