The INKA Strategic Program on Collaborative Research proposes establishing a large-scale, permanent, and mission-oriented regional platform to dramatically expand the scope, quality, and impact of collaborative scientific research in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). Although the region has experienced one of the fastest rates of growth in global scientific output over the past four decades, this expansion has occurred within a highly fragmented and weakly integrated research ecosystem, marked by low intra-regional collaboration and a strong reliance on extra-regional partners.

Evidence from global bibliometric studies consistently demonstrates that internationally co-authored research delivers higher citation impact, greater thematic frontier positioning, and stronger relevance for policy and innovation, particularly when collaboration is sustained, strategically structured, and embedded in institutional frameworks rather than isolated projects. In Latin America, the returns on collaboration are especially high, yet unevenly distributed across countries and institutions.

INKA responds to this structural gap by scaling up existing successful instruments—most notably PILAR (Proyectos de Investigación Latinoamericana en Red, originated in Uruguay’s ANII)—and embedding them within a long-term, multi-pillar regional strategy that combines collaborative funding, researcher mobility, shared infrastructure, and structured extra-regional cooperation. Over a five-year horizon, the program aims to mobilize USD 220-280 million, leveraging national research agencies, multilateral development banks, bilateral cooperation, philanthropic foundations, and selected private-sector partners.