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Minutes of AARINENA Executive Committee Meeting
8 November 2006, New Delhi-India

Present:
Dr. Ahmed Al-Bakri
Dr. Ismail Muharram
Dr. Majd Jamal
Dr. Mohamed Roozitalab
Dr. Mahmoud Solh
Dr. Ibrahim Hamdan

Absent:
Mr. Adnan Gibriel

The meeting was chaired by Dr. Ahmad Al-Bakri, the President of AARINENA who welcomed the participants in the meeting and requested the adoption of the Agenda. The Agenda of the meeting was adopted; the item on West Asia representative was delayed to the end.

The Minutes of the previous Exco meeting were approved. The Chair requested the Executive Secretary to go through the progress on the recommendations in these Minutes.

I. The Executive Secretary indicated that the WANA delegation to GFAR 2006 Conference was progressed as planned except the absence of Mr. Gibriel while all the other delegates have participated as planned.

Regarding the work plan proposed he informed the meeting that the implementation of the Inter-regional Information and Communication Management for Agricultural Research and Development (ICM4ARD) activities have been progressing very well and the last item of the program on NARIMS development has been sub-contracted to CLAES-Egypt and expected to be completed by the end of the year.

With regards to the establishment of the new two networks on Water Use Efficiency (WUE) and Biotechnology, the progress is going on both networks. Planned meeting for the WUE network will be held at ICARDA on 26-27 November, 2006 and a meeting on Biotechnology Network will be held at AGERI-ARC Egypt in the first quarter of 2007.

AARINENA delegation participated in the meeting of the Global Post Harvest Initiative in Linking Farmers to Markets, held in Cairo on September 11 2006.

As for the role of the Executive Committee members, Dr. Jamal stated that he sent letters to the Universities in Syria to join AARINENA and he did not receive any response. The Chair suggested personal contacts may be more effective.

II.With Regard to the item concerned with AARINENA Constitution and General Rules of Procedure, the Chair requested to send a letter thanking Dr. Papachristoforou on his efforts in reviewing the articles related to the election process. The Committee reviewed these comments and recommended the following:

1) Regarding the nominations of members of Executive Committee in absentia, it should be from full members participating in the General Conference on the basis of their administrative positions as stated in Article IX-1 of the constitution. The nominee should be present at the session.
2) Article 1X-1 of the constitution: it is clear that each member of the Executive Committee shall not be eligible for the same office for more than two terms including the President and Vice President; therefore there is no need for any other clarification or amendment to this article.
3) As for Article IX-5 which is concerned with voting by secret ballot, there is no need for any amendment. In this Article, it is meant: the chairman of the conference and not the nominating officer.

4) Regarding the Rule VIII-7 of the General Rules of Procedure, Article IX-1 of the Constitution includes such provision.

5) Article IX-6 concerned with filling of the vacant positions of the Executive Committee members by the unsuccessful candidate to that position. In the future when the sub-regions have more members such provision will be relevant and practical.

6) The reference of the pronoun “he” in the Constitution Articles will be amended to he/she and chairman to chairperson.

7) Rule XIV of the General Rules of Procedures will be changed to: “amendments or additions to these general rules may be adopted by a simple majority of…..” instead of “a two thirds majority” to be in line with Article XII of the Constitution.

8) The committee recommended the following amendments proposals to the Constitution to be presented for adoption in the next General Conference:

a. The General Conference will be held every three years and in line with this change the term for Executive Committee members be for three years renewable once for another 3 years. This amendment will improve the stability of the governance and continuing of the programs and save funds.
b. To add one new member to the Executive Committee for the position of the “President” in addition to the five sub-regional representatives and the Executive Secretary.
c. Add three new members to the Executive Committee to include one representative for (i) GFAR, (ii) one for CGIAR centers and (iii) one for CSOs.

The above proposed amendments should be made in writing and circulated to all full members at least sixty days before the next General Conference for adoption by a two-thirds majority vote.

III.The members discussed possible consideration to new proposal for Livestock Genetic Resources Conservation Network. It was recommended to contact ILRI and ICARDA for their support and for discussion in the next General Conference.

AREO-Iran indicated its interest in establishing regional IPM Network and it was recommended to consult ICARDA on this subject.

With regards to the last item on the agenda concerned with West-Asia representative, the committee recommended Pakistan representative, Dr. M. Afzal to represent West Asia sub-region on the committee as an observer up to the next General Conference and recommended that Dr. M. H. Roozitalab serve as an advisor to the Executive Committee due to his long experience in regional and global activities.

The Executive Secretary thanked Dr. Solh and ICARDA for providing all necessary facilities and operational costs for AARINENA activities since it hosted the Secretariat at ICARDA West Asia Regional Program at Amman-Jordan.
Finally, Dr. Ahmad Al-Bakri, the Chairman of the meeting thanked all present for their active participation and positive suggestions and recommendations to the meeting.