The Science Development Fund under the President of Azerbaijan has allocated one million manats for financing competitive projects in the sphere of information and communication technologies (ICT), the Fund's Executive Director Elchin Babayev said on Thursday at a conference in Baku.

According to Babayev, the competition is being held jointly with Azerbaijan's Ministry of Communications and Information Technologies. This is included in the plan of events approved in 2013 in connection with declaring this year as an ICT one.

Babayev said that all projects in such spheres as informational support, issues of innovative development, biometrics and cryptography, distant education and teaching resources and others will be accepted for participation in the competition.

The total volume of financing within the competition is envisaged in the amount of 1.2 million manats.

"The minimum budget of the projects presented for participation in the competition cannot exceed 10,000 manats and the projects' maximum budget is between 10,000 and 100,000 manats," the Fund's Executive Director said.

Employees of the Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences (ANAS), non-governmental organisations, independent scientists and other specialists of the ICT sphere can participate in the competition.

The projects accepted to the competition will be registered at the Copyright Agency of Azerbaijan.