Dear IFAC Friends and Colleagues,
Many changes and new initiatives within IFAC and its revised structure are taking ef-fect as of this triennium. One of them is the Activity Fund Committee. The Activity Fund Committee shall normally take care of the IFAC Activity Fund, the call of proposals, their evaluation and selection. It shall report to the Executive Officers for final approval.
The IFAC Activity Fund is chaired by Margret Bauer (DE), with members Paul Goulart (UK), Ayong Kim (KR), Carlos Eduardo Pereira (BR) and Tariq Samad (US). Newsletter readers will have the opportunity to hear more from the chair in the August issue, including some specifics about the first round of activities that have been supported through activity funds.
https://sites.ifac-control.org/activityfund
The Activity Fund is NOT for IFAC technical events as a whole. It is also not to be used for individual research projects. Additionally it is not used for setting up annually sponsored prizes/awards, as IFAC prizes and awards are carried out through IFAC directly and its Awards Committee. It is in place to support projects that may need some financial help to get off the ground to better the control com-munity. The next deadline for applications is 15 October 2021. Now is the time to be thinking about your ideas and proposals that you think would increase activity and involvement in the control community and that could use some financial support from IFAC to do so.
Other IFAC activities, events, and meetings are moving forward and taking place in these times, despite the continuation of the global pandemic. As international travel and gather-ings are not currently possible in their usual form the yearly IFAC Council and Related meetings will take place in a virtual format from 8-20 July 2021. We are appreciative of all of our great volunteers taking part in these meetings, especially as many will take place at times outside of the typical working day with the need to balance other professional and personal responsibilities as some re-sources that would ordinarily be available are still limited at this time.
Many technical events have been approved for 2021 and beyond. IFAC continues to publish its quality publications. The 39 Technical Committees (TCs) are also quite busy, and in this issue you will have the opportunity to hear from our Technical Board Vice-Chairs about some of the work they have been performing.
Wishing you and your loved ones health, peace, and happiness in these challenging times,
Hajime Asama, IFAC President 2020-2023