On 30 October 2015, IFIA Extraordinary General Assembly and Executive Committee meetings were organized in Nuremberg, Germany, Messe Nürnberg – Hall 12 from 10:00 am to 12:00. The meetings were declared open by IFIA President, Alireza Rastegar. The participants of Extraordinary GA were:
1- Afghanistan – Mr. Mustafa Rezaie 2- Brazil – Dr. Marcelo Vivacqua 3- BiH – Dr. Mladen Karic 4- Canada – Mr. Babak Khodaparast 5- Chad – Mr. Oumar Ayoumbaye 6- Check Rep. – Mr. Lukas ZMESKAL 7- Croatia – Mr. Zoran Barisic 8- China – Dr. Zengpei Xuan 9- Denmark – Mrs. Vivi Aakjaer 10- Egypt – Ms. Hebatalrahman A. 11- France – Ms. Catherine P. Cauchy 12- Georgia – Mr. Omar Bilonashvili 13- Germany – Mr. Winfried Sturm 14- Hong Kong China – Mr. Kau-sam Yeung 15- Iceland – Mrs. Elinora I. Sigurdardottir 16- India – Dr. Aynampudi Subbarao 17- Indonesia – Mr. Andi Dwi Putra 18- Iran – Mr. Hossein Vaezi 19- Iraq – Prof. Hazim Jabbar Al-Daraji 20- Korea Rep. – Mr. Shin Kyoung-ho 21- Lebanon – Mr. Radwan Chouaib 22- Libya – Mr. Jalal Saied Mohammed 23- Malaysia – Dr. Augustine S.H.Ong 24- Moldova – Ms. Tanya Iunal 25- Morocco – Mr. Majid EL Bouazzaoui 26- Nigeria – Dr. Hassane I. SOULEY 27- Niger – Mr. Joel Shaka Momodu 28- Palestine – Mr. Adnan SAMARA 29- Philippines – Dr. VIRGILIO L. Malang 30- Poland – Dr. Michal Szota 31- Portugal – Mr. Fernando Lopes 32- Qatar – Mr. Adnan Fahad Rashed 33- Romania – Mr. Stavar Lordan 34- Russia – Mr. Vladimir Petriasov 35- Slovenia – Dr. Ana Hafner 36- Spain – Mr. Manuel Matellán 37- Syria – Mr. Yasser Saada 38- Sweden – Mr. Cenneth Lindkvist 39- Taiwan, Province of China – Mr. James, Su 40- Togo – Mr. Amah D. Gnassingbe 41- Turkey – Mr. Koray SAHIN
The main focus of the General Assembly was IFIA Statutes amendment. The modifications included proposals from some EX-CO members, Geneva Welcome center (CAGI) and IFIA’s secretariat. The GA members examined all of the articles, presented their views and came to an agreement on them. Furthermore, they recommended revising the linguistic aspect of the Statutes. Among the changes applied on the statues, we can refer to the possibility to exclude non-active or non-cooperative members as well as the settlement of IFIA headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. The draft of the amended statutes is available here (Published at 15 November 2015).
The next issue hotly debated in the meeting was the establishment of membership fees. The following annual subscriptions were fixed by the unanimous agreement of the present delegates:
500 CHF and over for associations of least-developed countries
1000 CHF and over for associations of developing countries
2000 CHF and over for associations of developed countries
Afterward, Executive committee meeting was commenced with the presence of the following delegates: 1- BiH – Dr. Mladen Karic 2- Brazil – Dr. Marcelo Vivacqua 3- China – Dr. Zengpei Xuan 4- Croatia – Mr. Zoran Barisic 5- Denmark – Mrs. Vivi Aakjaer 6- Germany – Mr. Winfried Sturm 7-Iceland – Mrs. Elinora I. Sigurdardottir 8- India – Dr. Aynampudi Subbarao 9- Iran – Mr. Hossein Vaezi 10- Iraq – Prof. Hazim Jabbar Al-Daraji 11- Korea Rep. – Mr. Shin Kyoung-ho 12- Nigeria – Dr. Hassane I. SOULEY 13- Niger – Mr. Joel Shaka Momodu 14- Philippines – Dr. VIRGILIO L. Malang 15- Poland – Dr. Michal Szota 16- Portugal – Mr. Fernando Lopes 17- Russia – Mr. Vladimir Petriasov 18- Slovenia – Dr. Ana Hafner 19- Sweden – Mr. Cenneth Lindkvist
During the course of the meeting, it was unanimously decided by EX-CO members that IFIA’s Secretariat shall send an appeal to IFIA former president, Mr. Vedres, to clear the past financial situation of IFIA and to transfer all the money that is left in IFIA’s former account, owned by Mr. Vedres, to IFIA’s new official account.
Mr. Vedres shall also submit all the other official documents left either from his own presidency period or from Dr. Farag Moussa’s to IFIA office.
Moreover, Mr. Vedres’s intention as the leader of Association of Hungarian Inventor’s (MAFE) to resign from IFIA membership was announced during the meetings. He formally expressed his resignation in IFIA GA held in China, Kunshan on November 20 and IFIA members did not disagree on this issue. Afterwards, he sent three formal letters dated November 29, February 9 and December 15 to IFIA Secretariat declaring his resignation from IFIA.
Furthermore, Michal Szota form Poland was assigned by Mr. President as the new Director and Ms. Agnieszka Mikolajska form Poland replaced him as the new Executive Committee member.
Later in the meeting, Mr. Cenneth presented a brief report about Technology Transfer Center located in Stockholm. TTC management procedure is supposed to be prepared by IFIA Secretariat and presented in the next EXCO meeting.
Finally, Mr. Hossein Vaezi, IFIA Treasurer, presented IFIA’s financial report. It was agreed by the General Assembly that the members should pay the membership fees according to the new statutes and in due time.
IFIA financial report of 2015 will be published on IFIA’s website in January, 2016.
It was agreed to settle the venue and date of the next EX-CO meeting in IFIA virtual EX-CO meeting.