Nobel laureates to get bigger cash prize

This year’s Nobel laureates will be awarded with a larger cash prize worth over 1 million US dollars, the Nobel Foundation announced on Monday, one week ahead of the announcement of the 2017 Nobel winners.

The monetary awards – given to winners for their excellence in the fields of science, literature and peace – will be raised 12.5 percent compared to last year. “The 2017 Nobel Prize will amount to 9 million Swedish krona (1.12 million US dollars) per prize category,” the Nobel Foundation said in a statement.

Princess Madeleine, Princess Sofia and Prince Carl Philip of Sweden during the Nobel Prize ceremony at Stockholm Concert Hall, 2016 /Photo via Swedish Royal Court

“The Nobel Prize stands for science, humanism and international cooperation. At a time when knowledge and facts are being questioned, these values are more important than ever,” Carl-Henrik Heldin, Chairman of the Nobel Foundation, said in a press release.

After a decade of overspending, the foundation reduced the cash reward by 20 percent to 8 million from 10 million krona in 2012, in order to avoid long-term financial risk. Currently, the foundation’s capital situation has improved and is now stable.

Member of the Swedish Academy Horace Engdahl gives a speech about Bob Dylan during the ceremony at Stockholm Concert Hall, 2016. /Photo via Swedish Royal Court

Set up in 1900 and managed by the foundation, the capital that forms the base for the awards was donated in the will of Alfred Nobel, a Swedish scientist who invented dynamite.

This year’s first Nobel prize will be announced on Oct. 2 for the medicine category, followed by physics and chemistry over the next two days. The Nobel Peace Prize is expected to be revealed on Oct. 6, but no date has been set yet for the Nobel prize in literature.

(CGTN)