Federation of Asian Chemical Societies (FACS)

  Last updated on 28 Oct., 2004      

FACS EXCO Members 

FACS Project Directors 

Other Observers

AGENDA

1. Opening Remarks 
2. Announcement of Nominations of National Delegates
3. Finalization of Agenda
4. Approval of the Minutes of 10th General Assembly (October 1999, Taipei, Taiwan)
5. Report of President on State of FACS
6. Report of President-Elect (including the preparation of 9ACC)
7. Report of Secretary General (Prof. Kan-Nan Chen)
8. Report of Treasurer (Mr. Lim Teck Thai)
9. Report of Chairman of Publications Committee (Prof. Ta-hsin J. Chow)
10. Report on FACS Web Site (Prof. Xiaoxia Li)
11. Report of Coordinator of Projects (Dr. Mohinder Singh)
12. Report of Project Directors
13. Individual Membership Qualification
14. Discussion on FACS Distinguished Contribution to Advancement in Chemical Education Guideline (Dr. Barry N. Noller & Dr. Mohinder Singh)
15. Discussion on FACS Green Chemistry Award Guideline (Dr. Barry N. Noller & Dr. Mohinder Singh)
16. Report on Symposium on Analytical Science in Philippines (Dr. Fabian Dayrit)
17. Report on Progress on 10ACC and 12th GA by Vietnam Chemical Society
18. Approval of New Member Society-Israel Chemical Society
19. Proposal on Hosting 11ACC and 13th GA (Korean Chemical Society)
20. Review and Restructuring of FACS Projects
21. Proposal on Dates and locations of 41th EXCO and Council Meetings
22. Any Other Business (discussion only)
23. Announcement of New EXCO Members

The 11th General Assembly was chaired by Dr. Johnsee Lee, the President.

1. Opening Remarks by President
Prof. Noller, President-elect of FACS, made an opening remark on behalf of Dr. Lee, Dr. Lee is arriving at Brisbane airport by an early flight on July 1. On the beginning of 11th FACS General Assembly expressed his warm welcome to all EXCO members, national delegates and observers who attended the General Assembly. He also extends his welcome and appreciation to the President of IUPAC, Dr. Alan Hayes for his presence. 

Dr. Hayes, in his greetings, he pointed out the recent changes of IUPAC structure in order to meet the emergence of the rapid changes in Asia, Europe, North America (US and Canada), South America (Mexico and others) and African Regions. IUPAC and the regional chemical societies will work together and become a global base to carry out the research projects in order to meet the world’s needs.

2. Announcement of Nominations of National Delegates
Prof. Noller announced all representatives from member societies. There were a few apologies from Hong Kong Chemical Society, Jordanian Chemical Society, Chemical Society of Pakistan and Nepal Chemical Society. It was confirmed that 13 national delegates were required for the quorum of the general assembly, and 14 national delegates attended in the beginning and 2 late-coming delegates made the total participating member societies 16, which has satisfied the required quorum for discussion and decision. It was understood that the observers can express their opinion while only national delegates have voting rights. Absence of the following member societies: Iraq, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Thailand and Mongolia.

3. Finalization of Agenda
The agenda of 11th FACS General Assembly was approved. Professor John Webb proposed a motion to establish a new FACS project and will be it put it in the meeting agenda 22 (a separate sheet is provided) for discussion.

4. Approval of Minutes of 10th General Assembly (October 1999, Taipei, Taiwan)
The minutes of the 10th General Assembly were approved without amendment provided that the name of Korean national delegate, Prof. Jung-Il Jin’s name should be corrected.

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5. Report of President on State of FACS
Dr. Johnsee Lee, the FACS president, apologized for his belated arrival due to the long trip from San Francisco, Taipei, Sydney and Brisbane. He expressed his personal thanks to Dr. Hayes for his participation to the 11th FACS General Assembly. The co-operation and interaction with IUPAC is one of FACS’s missions. The recently established FACS web site is constructed by Prof. Xiaoxia Li, the project coordinator of ChIN. The web site will improve the communications among FACS member societies and members. FACS Newsletter is published twice a year, the recent issue has been published and mailed to all member societies. And on going FACS projects (e.g. acid rain, the defoliant Agent Orange, food analysis, natural products and etc.) are Asian-oriented research projects. 

The 9th Asian Chemical Congress (9ACC) and the 11th General Assembly are organized by Professor B. Noller and his colleagues. 9ACC will be held in conjunction with World Chemical Congress in Brisbane during the first week of July 2001. Three Executive Council (EXCO) meetings held in Taipei, Korea, and Hanoi, on November 1999, May 2000, and January 2001, respectively. The warm hospitality of the local hosts to every EXCO meeting is highly appreciated.

FACS awards of 9ACC were approved by EXCO, the recipients of Distinguished Young Chemist Award goes to Professor M. A. Brimble from New Zealand; Foundation Lectureship Award goes to Professor P. Haddad from Australia; and Distinguished Contribution to Economic Advancement Award goes to Dr. J. L. Yeo from Korea. Guidelines of new awards, such as Distinguished Contribution to Advancement in Chemical Education and Environmental Protection Award are under preparation and await for discussion and approval.

Chemistry plays a vital role in the development in Asia. Chemistry is also one of the most important forces behind the booming high-tech industry in Asia. Environmental pollution, energy deficiency and food shortage problems in Asia would require the devotion and assistance from chemists all over the world. Therefore, strengthening the communication and interaction among FACS member societies and with the rest of the world in order to help solving the above challenges should be the highest priority of FACS in the future.

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6. Report of President-Elect (including the preparation of 9ACC)
Prof. Noller briefly introduced the 9ACC and WCC program held in Convention Center along with locations of reception and banquet. He stated that the registration to WCC also covers the registration to 9ACC. Professor B. Noller reported the scientific programs of WCC and FACS awardees’ presentations are arranged on July 3 (Tuesday) and July 4 (Wednesday).

7. Report of Secretary General 
The secretariat work of FACS in the past year is fully supported by the Applied Chemistry Division, Union Chemical Laboratories of ITRI in Taiwan. Among those helpful staffs, Drs. Huey Huey Lo and Jer-Young Chen carried out the most FACS routine and trivial job. I express my sincere appreciation to their efforts on this secretariat work that is honorary and additional to their original job function as excellent applied research chemists.

In order to smooth out and strengthen future communications among FACS member societies, I would like to urge each member to identify a responsible individual to be a window with FACS secretariat. Or, someone has the connection with any representative of his society to pass along corresponding message.

There are three Society members express their interest to host 13th General Assembly and 11th Asian Chemical Congress in 2005. Those Society members include Korea, Mongolia, and South Pacific. I would like to remind the nomination of the 40th EXCO host (the one after the EXCO meeting in Brisbane) should be connected to the future FACS hosting country. 

Allow me to express my best personal thanks to our Vietnamese colleagues for hosting the 38th EXCO meeting and their kind arrangements made this meeting very fruitful. 

Professor John White, President of Royal Institute of Chemistry delivers a short welcome speech before the Treasurer’s report.

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8. Report of Treasurer 
Mr. Lim’s reported on a separated “Financial Statement for the year ending December 31 2000” (total 8 pages) is attached. Based on the detailed explanation given by the Treasurer, the report was approved. 

To all unpaid chemical societies, letters were sent to request them to raise their difficulties in writing to FACS for discussion and suggestion for a waiver or a deduction. 

Professor John Webb mentioned that Indonesia expressed their intention to remain as an effective FACS member. It was decided that Treasurer is responsible for contact and collecting their membership subscription.

A mandatory policy for unpaid chemical society and the proposal for best use of this money should be brought to the next EXCO meeting.

Professor B. Noller suggested GA be finished by 4:00 pm in order to join the reception held at the International Convention Center located on the other side of Brisbane river.

9. Report of Chairman of Publications Committee 
Prof. T. J. Chow, the chairman of publications committee, reported FACS Newsletter No. 2, 2001 has been published and distributed to our member societies and individual members. There were three special reports on this issue: 

• An introduction of Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) in Australia.
• The activities of ANEC/CREN (project of chemical research and environmental needs).
• Recent progress of FACS web pages and the electronic edition of the Newsletter.

The other major content in this issue is the introduction on the recipients of FACS awards, Foundation Lectureship (Professor P. R. Haddad); Distinguished Young Chemist Award (Professor M. A. Brimble) and Distinguished Contribution to Economic Development (Dr. Jong-Kee Yeo). 

Thanks to Drs. San H. Thang, P. Scheelings, B. Noller, R. Sadler, Xiaoxia Li and M. Singh for providing these information. 

This editorial works of this issue and the past two issues of FACS Newsletters were done mostly by executive editors, Drs. Jer-Young Chen and Huey Huey Lo. FACS Newsletter serves as an effective communication tool among project coordinators, our member societies and FACS individual members. However, the total publishing cost is about USD 6,000 per issue. The last three issues were subsidized by the Chemical Society located in Taipei and only few advertisements contribute a small portion of the total expenses. He pointed out the responsibility of future publication and its budget should be discussed and put into consideration.

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10. Report on FACS Web Site 
Prof. Xiaoxia Li, Project director of ChIN, presented the new FACS web site. She stated this web site serves as a global communications among the FACS society members and other individual members. Electronic publication of FACS Newsletter is also posted on the web site. The construction of this web site starts from Taipei 8ACC since 1999 and the domain name, http://www.facs-as.org/ is approved by EXCO in April 2001. The application fee of FACS domain name is 150 USD. Prof. Li also expressed her thanks to Drs. Jer-Young Chen and Huey Huey Lo’s help to speed up the construction process of the web site. The contents of the web sit is summarized and also published on the FACS Newsletter as following:

• About FACS; 
• FACS projects, meetings, events and other activities of member societies;
• Electronic publication of the FACS Newsletter, journals, such as chemical journal of ACGC;
• Generating a database of expertise, research area and contact details etc to facilitate interactions among the scientists in this region. 

The design of FACS web site is quite professional. It has potential to generate revenue for FACS by adding logos and links of commercial company to sponsor FACS web site.

Professor Noller mentioned the project of ChIN was initiated on the event of 4ACC at Beijing 1993. Project ChIN will be the web master to update the FACS web site. The detailed introduction and description of the newly constructed FACS web site is reported by Dr. Xiaoxia Li as attached on p. 20 of the handout of the 11th General Assembly and on page 32 of the 2001 No. 2 issue of FACS Newsletter.

There was a web page constructing fee of 1,000 USD, approved in the 38th EXCO, should be paid to Prof. Xiaoxia Li by FACS Treasurer.

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11. Report of Coordinator of Projects 
Document of report of FACS projects by Dr. Mohinder Singh was attached on the handout of the 11th General Assembly p. 25-29.

12. Report of Project Directors
Dr. Mohinder Singh prepared a separate report on FACS projects from 1999 to 2000 

• ANEC activities were reported by Dr. Ross Saddler, project director of ANEC, on the handout of the 11th General Assembly p.30-33. Asian unique environment demands unique environment chemistry. ANEC has established a web page NECTAR (Network for Environmental Chemistry throughout the Asia Pacific Region) on the following web site.
  http://chin.icm.ac.cn/FACS/projects/cren-introduction-2001.PDF
• ACEN (The Asian-Pacific Chemical Education Network) activities were reported by Professor M. M. Ito, project director of ACEN, on the handout of the 11th General Assembly p 34 and p. 44. ACEN activities are also available on the home page http://www/t/soka/ac/kp/chem/ACEN/8accpanel/. An electronic publication of chemical education journal is posted on the home page. Professor Ito suggests a subgroup of ACEN will be discussed in next EXCO meeting. Professor Noller to published on the FACS web site an invite UNESCO to be involved.
• ANCP (Asian Network for Cleaner Production) project (p 19 on the blue separate project report). 
• APFAN activities were reported by Dr. Pieter Scheelings, project director of APFAN, on the handout of the 11th General Assembly p. 35-37.
• ANAIC (Asian Network for Analytical and Inorganic Chemistry) activities were reported by Professor J. Webb, project director of ANAIC, on a separate sheet. Three activities have been held at various locations. A training course regarding Laboratory maintenance was held in Royal University of Phnom Penh, Cambodia (12/1999). Thirty participants from chemistry, biology and physics departments attended this one-week training course. Research Seminar on Bio-availability of heavy metal in traditional and processed foods. 
  A shipment of chemistry textbooks to the National University of Lao P. D. R., Dong Dok is arranged by Professor Webb from Australian Universities.
• ChIN activities were reported by Dr. Xiaoxia Li on the handout of the 11th General Assembly p. 17.
• ANRAP (Asian Network of Research on Antidiabetic Plants) activities were reported on p. 25 of FACS Projects Report (1999-2000). The 3rd International Symposium on Plant Materials as a Source of Antidiabetic Agents was held in November 2000 in Khada, Bangladesh. Dr. Salestoor from Cameroon and Dr. P. Balakurder from Nepal stayed in Dhaka for 6 and 3 months, respectively.
  Dr. M. Singh suggested new projects in addition to the current 8 FACS projects with one subproject. New project proposal is required to send to General Assembly for approval by official national representatives and then become the legal formal project. The contribution from FACS to each project is 500USD and to each sub-project is 200 USD.
• Local Produced Low Cost Equipment (LPLCE) Project reported on page 34 by K. V. Sane and new project on p. 35. p. 51 for the guideline of FACS seed money (on the blue separate project report).
• Professor Noller explains ACGC on p. 36-40.
  “Informative Technology and Women Empowerment” was proposed as a new FACS project on the blue separate project report p. 35.

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13. Individual Membership Qualification
Life Members were listed on the handout of the 11th General Assembly p 39-41. New life members on last column of p. 41 were approved. The list of life member will be updated and supplied by Mr. Lim. It was pointed out to put these new members on the mailing list of FACS Newsletter.

14. Discussion on FACS Distinguished Contribution to Advancement in Chemical Education and FACS Green Chemistry Award Guideline Guidelines 
The drafts of chemical education and green chemistry award guidelines were published on the handout of the 11th General Assembly p. 42-43. The guideline of Distinguished Contribution to Advancement in Chemical Education award was approved with a few amendments as following:

The contribution shall be judged on evidence including lists of papers, publications, patents, reports and teaching innovation submitted to the adjudicating panel.

Distinguished Contribution to Advancement in Green Chemistry was suggested to be replaced by Distinguished Contribution to Advancement in Environmental Chemistry, the award guideline was suspended and left to next EXCO and General Assembly for discussion.

15. Discussion on FACS Green Chemistry award guideline 
The guideline is originated and proposed by Professor B. Noller and Dr. M. Singh. Due to the green chemistry concerning the various aspects, it is deferred for the further discussion. 

16. Report on Symposium on Analytical Science in Philippines 
Dr. Fabian Dayrit reported “Asia-Pacific Conference on Analytical Science” organized by Chemical Society of the Philippines and Organic Chemistry Teachers’ Association, which will be held on February 19-22, 2002 in Manila, Philippines. Detailed information is reported on the handout of the 11th General Assembly p 45-47.

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17. Report on the Progress of 10ACC and 12th GA by Vietnam Chemical Society
Professor Ho Si Thoang, the Chairman of the National Organizing Committee of Vietnam, expressed their confidence to host the chemical congress of FACS. He extended his welcome to FACS members to visit Hanoi, a city with 1,000 years of history. The detailed progress report of 10th ACC and 12th General Assembly was prepared on a separate report.

Visa application form will be available on the web for easy accessibility. The organization committee will consider serving the lunch for all participants during the conference. 10ACC will be held in conjunction with Euroasia conference on the same site and the same time with only one registration fee.

18. Approval of New Member Society-Israel Chemical Society
The application from Israel chemical society to become a FACS new member society went through a brief discussion. The fact that Israel chemical society is part of Federation of European Chemical Society (FECS) does not prohibit her in becoming a FACS member.

This proposal of FACS new member from the application of Israel Chemical Society was passed and the application was approved. Israel Chemical Society became the 27th FACS member society.

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19. Proposal on Hosting 11ACC and 13th GA 
Professor Sung Soo Kim presented the proposal on behalf of Korean Chemical Society on hosting 11ACC and 13th GA of FACS. Korea as the hosting country of 11ACC and 13th GA was approved. The proposed conference date will be on June 26-30 2005 or Aug. 28 to Sep. 1, 2005 at Korea University or COEX Inter-continental Hotel in Seoul, Korea. The registration Fee was suggested to be 350 USD for the general participants and 150 USD for the students. The detailed information is attached on the handout of the 11th General Assembly p 61-63. 

In order to attract more participation from different Asian regions, Professor Ohtaki suggested the registration fee should be fixed at 200 USD. Any adjustment of the registration fee should be subjected to EXCO’s approval. The allowance and the accommodations for every FACS national delegate should be subjected to the hosting country’s decision. For the sake of participants from developing countries, less expensive hotels or campus accommodations have to be arranged and considered. It was suggested the organizing committees of Vietnam and Korea put it into consideration.

20. Review and Restructuring of FACS Projects
A copy of “Draft Proposal for Restructuring of FACS Projects” was attached. Professor Ohtaki suggested those inactive project directors be replaced and the opinions from the Coordinator of Projects are needed.

21. Proposal for the Location and the Date of 12th Asian Chemical Congress and 14th General Assembly of FACS
Representatives from Bangladesh, Malaysia and China expressed their interest in hosting the 12th ACC and 14th General Assembly of FACS in 2007. This will be discussed and decided in the next EXCO (40th EXCO) meeting.
The 40th EXCO is scheduled in December 2001, at Singapore. The 41st EXCO was tentatively scheduled in March 2002 at Beijing which coincides with the International Conference of Chemical Education. And the 42nd EXCO was scheduled in Dec. 2002 at Bangladesh. 

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22. Other Business (discussion only)
Professor J. Webb of RACI proposed a motion on the chemical professional ethics: the Chemical Disarmament (a separated sheet is attached). Professor Ohtaki seconded and mentioned that IUPAC has such ongoing project and Japanese scientists joined in that campaign against the chemical warfare. This motion is accepted and will be put into the agenda on the next EXCO meeting.

Professor Jung-Il Jin of Korea, mentioned that the GA and the ACC of FACS are taking place at the same year as IUPAC Chemical Congress. It is difficult for most of colleagues to participate these two meetings at different locations in the same year. In order to attract more participants to the FACS meetings, therefore, he proposed the changes of the FACS meeting (both GA and ACC) schedule defer one year in the next coming event, for example, the FACS event in Korea, can be changed to 2006 instead of 2005. This motion will bring to the discussion on the next (40th) EXCO meeting. 

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23. Announcement of New EXCO Members
The term of EXCO member (1999-2001) is completed at the end of the 11th General Assembly. The FACS business will be transferred to the new FACS EXCO members (serving the term of 2001-2003 after 12th General Assembly in Vietnam) under the leadership of Professor Barry Noller, the new President of FACS.

Professor B. Noller indicated the improvement on the communications among FACS members and the ongoing projects would be achieved by means of the FACS Newsletter and the FACS web site in the future. He expressed his appreciation for the supports and it is his privilege to serve the FACS.

The new EXCO members comprise Professor Barry Noller (Australia) (The President of FACS), Professor Ho Si Thoang (Vietnam) (the President-elect), Dr. Johnsee Lee (Taiwan) (The Past-president), Professor M. M. Ito (Japan) (Coordinator of Projects), Professor T. H. Chow (Taiwan) (the Chairman of Publications Committee), Dr. Ting-Kueh Soon (Malaysia) ( the Treasurer) and Dr. San H. Thang (Australia) the Secretary-General.

The 39th EXCO meeting will be held at 6:00 pm, July 3 (Tuesday) at A7 River Room, Southbank (across from the Convention Center) the same venue as 9 ACC.

The meeting adjourned at 16:20. 

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