Pharmacy Scholarships Nobody Lists: Five FIP Awards, and the Split That Decides Your Route

Pharmacy splits in two, and almost nobody explains it to students before they waste a year.

Clinical pharmacy abroad is a licensing problem. Dispensing, hospital pharmacy, community pharmacy — to do these in the United States, the United Kingdom or Australia you must register with that country’s pharmacy regulator, which means examinations, supervised practice and English tests with their own fees and timetables. No scholarship substitutes for registration. Each regulator publishes its own route, and that route is where your effort belongs.

Pharmaceutical sciences is a research problem, and research attracts real money. Drug delivery, formulation, pharmacology, pharmacoeconomics, regulatory science and industrial pharmacy all sit inside the funded research world, and the European salaried doctorate applies to every one of them.

Between those two sits a third layer almost nobody knows about: the awards the International Pharmaceutical Federation runs for early career pharmacists from countries like ours. Five of them, and no scholarship website lists any.

The five FIP awards

1. Early Career Leadership Development Scholarships

Six scholarships, covering the FIP World Congress and the Leadership Development Workshop.

What it covers is unusually concrete: congress registration, five nights of hotel accommodation to a maximum of €625, the visa fee if you need one, travel compensation based on your region with prior approval, one year of individual FIP membership, a meeting with FIP Foundation and regional leaders, and mentors from the early career group and your region.

For the 2026 congress in Montreal, applications ran from 3 November 2025 to 7 January 2026.

Payment works in halves. Fifty per cent arrives before the congress by bank transfer, and the remaining fifty per cent after you submit your post-congress and three-month progress reports.

2. FIP Foundation and ECPG Innovation Research Grant

€1,000 to implement a project, and if your project report is accepted, the award may add complimentary registration, a return airfare and hotel accommodation for the next world congress.

Projects may come from any field of pharmacy, and must focus on innovation with direct clinical application. Judges weigh significance and relevance, creativity, scientific accuracy, feasibility and clarity.

The 2025 round has closed, and FIP indicated the next call would launch in the second quarter of the following year.

3. Mike How Travel Award

Up to €1,500 towards transport, accommodation and registration for the FIP Congress, plus free attendance at the Industrial Pharmacy Section pre-satellite workshops and an invitation to the section dinner.

It targets young pharmacists and pharmacy students with a serious interest in industrial pharmacy — pharmaceutical development, manufacturing or regulatory work.

If you want to work in pharma industry rather than a pharmacy, this one was built for you, and almost nobody applies because almost nobody has heard of it.

4. HAMIS Stipend

Support to attend the next FIP Congress, for pharmacy students, early career pharmacists and pharmaceutical scientists who live, work or study in a country classified by the World Bank as low, lower-middle or upper-middle income.

FIP does not publish the amount. Questions go to ecpg@fip.org.

5. Ton Hoek Scholarship for Young Leaders

Attendance at the FIP Congress and the Leadership Development Workshop, for a young leader recognised for inspiring others to advance pharmacy practice, pharmaceutical sciences or pharmacy education.

Eligibility criteria, route by route

FIP Early Career Leadership Development Scholarships

• A pharmacist, pharmacy educator or pharmaceutical scientist.
• Graduated within the past eight years from your first degree in pharmacy or pharmaceutical sciences.
• Living, working or studying in a country the World Bank classifies as low, lower-middle or upper-middle income. Pakistan sits inside that group.
• Nationality does not matter, and FIP states you do not need to live where it has member organisations.
• Previous recipients of FIP Foundation support are not eligible.

That eight-year window is the rule that decides most applications, and it runs from your first degree rather than your most recent one.

FIP Innovation Research Grant

• An early career pharmacist or pharmaceutical scientist who belongs to FIP’s early career group.
• A project focused on innovation with direct clinical application, from any field of pharmacy.
• A commitment to submit a project report, present at the FIP Congress and provide interim reports.

Mike How Travel Award

• A member of FIP’s early career group or the International Pharmaceutical Students’ Federation.
• A young pharmacist or pharmacy student with a strong interest in industrial pharmacy.

HAMIS Stipend

• A pharmacy student, early career pharmacist or pharmaceutical scientist.
• Resident, working or studying in a low, lower-middle or upper-middle income country.

European doctoral positions in pharmaceutical sciences

• A master’s degree in pharmacy, pharmaceutical sciences or a related field.
• Research fit with the advertised position.
• No tuition fee, a salary, and usually no nationality restriction.

The application process, step by step

For the FIP leadership scholarship

Step one. Check the eight-year window. Count from your first degree. If you graduated more than eight years ago, this particular award has closed to you and the others on this page have not.

Step two. Join FIP’s early career group, since several of these awards require membership and the leadership scholarship includes a year of membership as a benefit.

Step three. Line up two recommendations early. FIP asks for one from a supervisor, manager, employer or dean, and a second from a national pharmacy or pharmaceutical sciences organisation. That second one takes longer than people expect, because it comes from an institution rather than a person.

Step four. Write a two-page letter of interest and a two-page CV. Both are capped at two pages, which is short. Say what you intend to change in pharmacy practice in your own country, not what the congress will do for you.

Step five. Gather your degree certificate and a recent photograph, which FIP lists among the required documents.

Step six. Submit electronically through the FIP Foundation website inside the window. Watch for it to open in early November.

Step seven. Plan for the reporting. Half the money arrives after the congress, once you file a post-congress report and a three-month progress report. Treat those as part of the award rather than an afterthought.

For the Innovation Research Grant

Watch for the call in the second quarter of the year. Build a project with a direct clinical application rather than a purely laboratory question, since that is the stated criterion. Expect to present it at the congress.

For a European doctoral position

Search EURAXESS and national academic job boards for doctoral positions in pharmaceutical sciences, pharmacology or drug delivery, and apply with a CV and a motivation letter as you would for any job. Our DTU Denmark post, Örebro guide and ORFeus guide explain that market.

Frequently asked questions

Can a scholarship let me work as a pharmacist in the US or UK?

No. Practising pharmacy requires registration with that country’s pharmacy regulator, which sets its own examinations, supervised practice and English requirements. Go to the regulator’s own website for the current route, and budget for examination fees rather than looking for funding that does not exist.

Are these FIP awards actually scholarships?

Mostly they fund congress attendance, leadership development and research projects rather than degrees. We would rather say that plainly. Their value lies in the mentors, the membership and the network, which is how academic and industry pharmacy careers actually open.

Do I need to be a FIP member?

For some awards, yes. The early career group membership underpins several of them, and the leadership scholarship includes a year of individual membership as part of the award.

What if I graduated more than eight years ago?

The leadership scholarship closes to you, but the Innovation Research Grant, the Mike How Travel Award and the HAMIS Stipend do not carry that same eight-year rule in the material we read. Check each one’s current terms.

I want to work in the pharmaceutical industry, not a pharmacy. Is anything here for me?

The Mike How Travel Award, specifically. It exists for people interested in pharmaceutical development, manufacturing and regulatory work, and it is the least crowded award on this page.

Can I apply for more than one?

FIP states that previous recipients of FIP Foundation financial support are not eligible for the leadership scholarship. Beyond that, read each award’s terms rather than assuming.

How much is the travel compensation?

It depends on your region and requires prior approval from the FIP Foundation office. FIP does not publish a table, so ask before you book anything.

When do applications open?

The 2026 leadership scholarship ran from 3 November to 7 January. The Innovation Research Grant call was expected in the second quarter. Neither is a promise for the next cycle, so watch fipfoundation.org from early November.

Who should pursue what

If you graduated within eight years and want a career in pharmacy leadership or academia, the Early Career Leadership Development scholarship is the strongest item here, and the window likely opens within weeks.

If you want the pharmaceutical industry, the Mike How Travel Award is built for you and barely contested.

And If you have a research project with clinical application, the Innovation Research Grant funds it at €1,000 and can carry you to the congress on top.

If you want a full research degree, look at European doctoral positions before scholarships. Pharmaceutical sciences is one of the best-funded doctoral areas there is.

And if you want to dispense medicines abroad, close this page and open your target country’s pharmacy regulator. That is the honest answer, and it is the only one that leads where you want to go.

This guide is part of our complete guide to scholarships for medical students.

We checked every claim on this page on 13 October 2026.