Statement of the 41nd Governing Board

The Governing Board of the International Science and Technology Center (ISTC) held its 41st meeting in Moscow, Russian Federation.

Representatives from 12 ISTC Parties attended with Canada, the European Union, Japan, Russian Federation, United States of America, and Armenia represented on the Governing Board. Armenia participated as rotating CIS Board member.

The Governing Board approved the extension of Mr. Ronald F. Lehman II (US) in the position of Governing Board Chairman through 01 April 2008. The Governing Board approved the extension of Mr. Norbert Jousten (EU) in the position of Executive Director until October 15, 2007. The Governing Board confirmed its earlier decision, to appoint Prof. Waclaw Gudowski as EU Deputy Executive Director for a two-year period and expressed its gratitude to Mr. Uwe Meyer who has served in the position of Deputy Executive Director from 2000 until 31 October 2006.

The ISTC approved 31 new projects representing over $3.9 million and Euro 4.0 million in new funding for activities in Russia, Belarus, Tajikistan and Kyrgyz Republic. These projects highlight important areas of science and technology research and development. The Governing Board announced that 18 new Partners have joined the ISTC and that approximately $10.2M in new Partner project funding since its last meeting. To date, 591 Partner projects have been funded for a total of over $224M. Total ISTC project funding in all categories now surpasses US $740 million for 2429 projects.

The Board agreed to put the issue of dual membership at the ISTC and the STCU on the agenda of its next meeting.

The Governing Board approved the FY 2007 Administrative Operating Budget and Supplemental Budget Programs.

The Governing Board considered general revision the ISTC Project Proposal Package intended to improve the readability of the Package and raise the quality of ISTC project proposals. However further discussions will be continued with a view to reach an agreement on the procedure related to project proposal processing.

The Board reviewed the current status of implementation of joint ISTC-STCU regular projects and approved the concept of “joint ISTC-STCU Partner Projects” and instructed the ISTC Secretariat to work with the STCU Secretariat on appropriate amendments to their current Administrative Arrangement on Joint Projects to include additional steps specific to such joint Partner Projects.

Highlighting the importance of IPR issues in reaching sustainability objectives the Board invited all Parties to formally establish their internal national procedures for handling IPR arising from regular projects and considered the “Coordinated procedure of interaction between Recipients, Secretariat and ISTC Funding Parties developed during IP Working Group meetings.

The Governing Board held a comprehensive discussion over ISTC Strategic Planning and has determined that the ISTC has played a valuable role in the field of nonproliferation and should further investigate and refine some of the transformational opportunities. In preparation for further discussions on this issue during the upcoming year, the Governing Board instructed the Secretariat to: elaborate a methodology to assess the result of ISTC’s operations; and in parallel, but without prejudice to the outcome of the previous point, to develop a Strategic Plan. Such a Plan should remain within the remit of the ISTC agreement, incorporate the GB’s comments on the future path of ISTC, and include an analysis of the timeframe and resources, which may be required to implement the changes. These documents should be submitted to the next Governing Board meeting. Following direction by the Board, the strategic plan will eventually also serve as the basis for the elaboration of a reorganization of the secretariat.

The Governing Board agreed to convene the next Plenary Session in Moscow on 29 March 2007.

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