Publications Committee

2004-2005 Committee Members

Alan Bond (Chair), UK

Jill Baker (Board Liaison), Canada

Carmen Teresa Senior Carballo, Venezuela

Aleg Cherp, Hungary

Richard Grasseti, USA

Maureen Hill, Canada

Jennifer Howell, USA (IAIA HQ)

Keryn James, Australia

Joseph Milewski, USA/Canada

Peter Tarr, Namibia

Keith Wiseman, South Africa

Christopher Wood, United Kingdom (IAPA co-editor)

2000-2001 Mid-term Report

Responsibilities of the Publications Committee

The IAIA Publications Committee has oversight of all IAIA publications activities, excepting those directly pertaining to the Annual Meeting and other specific events. The range of IAIA publications includes the Journal Impact Assessment and Project Appraisal, the Newsletter, promotional materials (annual renewal and membership brochures), the Website, the ListServers and the Key Citation lists.

There is a separate editorial board for the Journal, responsible for advising the Journal Editor and the Publications Committee on matters relating to the content of the Journal. Members of the Editorial Board are appointed by the Publications Committee.

Action Plan 2000 -2001

The Committee has had two main goals for 2000. The first has been to assist in the completion of the updating of the website and the redesign of publications to support this new image for IAIA. The second, to look at the needs of our growing membership and assess whether the existing publications and their format best meet these needs, particularly the demand for on-line information.

New Membership Brochure
Mary Lou Morris coordinated the production during August/September 2000 of a new membership brochure keyed to the vision statement and new priorities of the Association. The design reflects a new image which will flow through to other hard copy materials.

Website
Users appreciate the 24 hour a day service, and the cross-platform accessibility. They increasingly demand a rapid update of materials.

Streamlining of the tabs on the Homepage has created some concerns from Affiliates and the Training Section who would like to see a further breakup of the 'News and Networking' section to provide a more obvious route to their particular areas of interest. This is being considered, together with the idea of offering an outline form site index.. Jenni is in the process of adding hit counters to a number of the pages to give us some idea of present usage (from 15 September to 31 October about 3600 hits for the home page).

Frank Vanclay has focused attention on the ongoing support needed for the Listserv. He will continue to coordinate this service for us while he remains at Charles Sturt University, but points to a future time when he (and the University's facilities) will no longer be available. It would be possible to transfer these to the Executive Office, but there would still be a need for the moderation and general support and advice which is presently provided by Frank and which would need to be picked up by another member of the Publications Committee. We are very grateful the Frank continues for the present in this role. Frank has worked to rationalise the number of current listservs: these are now:                                   

IAIA_NEWS general news posting
IAIA_ECOLOGY ecological impact assessment and biodiversity issues
IAIA_HEALTH health impact assessment
IAIA_PROFDEV professional development issues
IAIA_SIA social impact assessment  (incorporating indigenous issues)
IAIA_STRATEGIC strategic impact assessment
IAIA_URBAN urban environmental issues

Tuija Hilding-Rydevik is the coordinator of the revitalised IAIA Research listserv.

There is some demand for a web forum. The software is available, but this still leaves the problem of identifying how much of the Executive Office resources would be required to service the forum. Probably at this stage a 'nice to have', but not a major priority.

Also suggested has been the possibility of members-only access to some parts of the web site as a way of convincing people of the value of their IAIA membership. This is presently being investigated, as is secure transmission for payments. Pending available funding, the Publications Committee has recommended that the Executive Office acquire software to enable posting of PDF documents.

Training database and other learning materials
There was a coordinated push at Hongkong to retrieve the EIA training database from the Australian EIA network and transfer it to our website. The idea is attractive, and feasible if resources would stretch. At present however it seems that this cannot have priority over other activities associated with the website.

There was also a discussion about IAIA providing a 'home' for the updated UNEP Manual. This however requires considerable resources, and as no definite offer of funding has yet been received from UNEP it is another facet of an expanding training role which we can't yet accommodate.

Newsletter
Clare Brooke resigned from the position of Newsletter Facilitator six months ago. The new Newsletter Facilitator is Parvaiz Naim, who now becomes a member of the Publications Committee.

Copyright
Concern was raised that copyright material from IAIA members, and published in Impact Assessment, had been extensively used in a recent EIA textbook without acknowledgment and without permission. After protracted negotiation this matter has been amicably settled (mainly due to the generosity of the IAIA authors). It has led us to review and strengthen procedures for copyright release.

Goals for 2000-2001

The major goal continues to be the upgrading of the website. It is also apparent that we don't have an answer to the ongoing problem of updating key citations. There continues to be little demand for the hardcopy version of these.
 
Publications Committee members

Chair: Mary McCabe
Board Liaison: Tuija Hilding-Rydevik
Executive  Office Representative: Jenni Howell
Journal Editor: Chris Wood
Book Review Editor: (Stewart Lockie)
Professional Practice Editor: (John Page)
Sections Committee Representative: Jo Treweek
Newsletter Facilitator: Parvaiz Naim
ListServe Coordinator: Frank Vanclay
Website Coordinator: Mary McCabe
Key Citations Coordinator: Kristi Branch
Members appointed by the IAIA Board: Tom Roper, Elsa Joao, Alan Bond, Ingvild Swensen, Keith Wiseman, Tuija Hilding Rydevik, Riki Therival, George Sammy.