Croatian scientists and business people expressed support for the country’s membership with the European Organisation for Nuclear Research, known as CERN, ahead of the signing of an associate membership agreement on February 28.

Associate member status will make it possible for Croatia to participate in CERN-funded projects on an equal footing, Croatian scientists and business people said.

It will improve the quality of education and research by Croatian scientists and increase the mobility of scientists and specialists.The status will also open up business opportunities for Croatian software, construction, electrical engineering and healthcare companies.

Croatia will contribute a total of CHF 1 million annually to finance CERN activities.

The agreement will be signed in Zagreb by Minister Blazenka Divjak and CERN director-general Fabiola Gianotti, after earlier this year the Croatian government decided to initiate the procedure to conclude the associate membership deal with that Geneva-based international scientific institute.

In mid-2018, a CERN delegation visited Croatia to check if the country fulfils membership criteria.

The ministry underscored that the associate membership will be a huge step forward for making Croatia’s science more visible in international circles.

CERN was established in 1954. It has 22 member states currently: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, and Israel is the only non-European country granted full membership.

In 2016 it had 2,500 scientific, technical, and administrative staff members, and hosted about 12,000 users. In the same year, CERN generated 49 petabytes of data.