Es Tiempo de Volver — Colombia's 2014 Postdoctoral Repatriation Call for Colciencias

In 2013, 749 Colombian researchers living abroad wrote an open letter to the government protesting the country's weak conditions for scientific careers. In response, the national science agency Colciencias (now Ministerio de Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación) launched 'Es Tiempo de Volver' in 2014, a targeted call to repatriate Colombian PhD holders working overseas.
The programme offered funded two-year postdoctoral positions at Colombian universities, research centres and productive-sector institutions, paying a monthly stipend of COP 6 million tax-free plus relocation costs and tax benefits, with an initial budget of COP 17.2 billion aimed at bringing back around 200 senior researchers across 35 host institutions.
883 applicants met the eligibility requirements, but Colciencias reduced the funded budget to roughly COP 11 billion and cut the number of funded postdoctoral placements from 200 to 140; the state agricultural research corporation Corpoica alone absorbed 29 of the repatriated researchers into its regional stations.
Colombian media (El Espectador, El Tiempo) reported that researchers faced payment delays and administrative confusion during rollout, and independent commentary characterised the call as 'improvised' — illustrating the risk of a repatriation scheme launched reactively without a stable, multi-year funding pipeline; Es Tiempo de Volver was not repeated as a recurring annual call.

Read the full analysis: https://legadoweb.minciencias.gov.co/noticias/colciencias-lanza-es-tiempo-de-volver-la-convocatoria-de-repatriaci-n-de-cient-ficos