GA/10/RECORD
10 December 2010
GENERAL ASSEMBLY, THURSDAY, 9 DECEMBER 2010
10.30 am, Room IV, World Council of Churches
RECORD
1. Adoption of the agenda: the agenda (GA/10/1) was adopted without change. The list of participants is in Annex 1. The meeting welcomed a number of former officials who, though not yet members, had shown interest in joining the Association.
2. Election of Chairperson: Rosemary Ribes was elected Chairperson by acclamation.
3. Report on activities: the President of the Executive Committee (EC), René Kirszbaum, introduced the various sections of the annual report (GA/10/2), which provided a briefing on what the Committee had been doing in the period December 2009 to November 2010. He noted that since the report had been circulated, it had been found that three additional contributions had been received, bringing the number of paid-up members to 36. He circulated a thank-you letter from the Principal of the Indian girls’ school that had received the computers from HCR.
4. It was clear from the report that the Association had now reached cruising speed. There had been a number of activities carried out over the year, of different kinds, to the satisfaction of the beneficiaries and the members who had undertaken them. A number of others were on the drawing board, and first steps had been taken. Consideration of the report gave rise to discussion, as summarised in the paragraphs that follow:
a) There was an ongoing issue relating to the nature of the services that the Association was in a position to provide. This was connected to the means available to the Association for making its availability more widely known. Some activities involved the direct delivery of a service to the beneficiary, eg the lectures in the Université ouvrière de Genève. Others consisted in facilitating the provision of a service, eg the computers to India project. In still others the Association played the role of an intermediary, by finding human or financial resources for other providers, eg the GTZ project in Azerbaidjan. That being said, the Association did not have a primary vocation as a fund-raiser, or provider of funding; in fact it had been rather unsuccessful so far in raising funds for its own activities. The Assembly reiterated the remark made at the last session, to the effect that it was desirable to have in the EC a member with recent fund-raising experience in the NGO context.
b) As for making the human capital of the Association more widely known to the donor and beneficiary communities, this too was a mixed result. The roster of members meant to serve as an indicator of the talents available, had so far attracted only 19 entries. As far as beneficiaries of direct aid were concerned, there had been some success: a meeting had been held with LDC representatives, and a list of areas for action agreed. The Association had also been active with a number of NGOs; the sheer number of them in the Geneva area made it likely that such contacts would continue to bear fruit in terms of activities for the Association. Getting the national aid agencies and international organisations interested was, however, another matter, and perhaps more needed to be done on that score. The mere fact of providing services essentially free of charge was apparently not enough on its own to attract their attention.
c) There was some discussion of the prospective project consisting of providing assistance to LDC missions with their document management. This would initially be a pilot with three or four missions, with the help of the WTO document management services. There was a technical side to the project of course, for which most members were not necessarily equipped, but there was also the aspect of understanding the workings of international organisations, and each LDC’s areas of main interest, which would have an impact on how they organised their documentation. Here the wealth of experience of members would definitely be an asset. As for the duration of the project, and the commitment that would be required of members, these would become more apparent with the first experiences.
5. The Assembly took note of the report.
6. Financial reports: the Treasurer, Catherine Bertrand, presented the accounts for 2010, as at 30 November 2010 (GA/10/3 and 4). Income had amounted to CHF 13,339, as against expenditure of CHF 2,924. The carry over in 2011 would be some CHF 10,000.
7. In the budget for 2011 (GA/10/5), expenditure of some CHF 7,000 was foreseen, including a modest amount for operational expenses, and an assumption that the rent at WCC would continue to be covered by the Swiss authorities. Any larger scale operations would have to be financed by specific donations. It was remarked that some of the projects for which funding was being sought were probably of too little importance financially to be of interest to major donor nations. This might be a reason to consider grouping projects by type, and making a global and more consequential appeal to donors for funding. In any case, asking donors in the abstract whether they would be prepared to finance Greycells activities was probably never going to elicit a positive response.
8. Some new members paid their dues for 2011 at the meeting, and postal “bulletins de versement” were now available for those who wished to make payments that way. A general appeal for payment would be made separately.
9. The accounts for 2010 and the budget for 2011 were approved unanimously.
10. Election of the Executive Committee: The EC was elected every two years. It had last been elected in 2008, so it was time to renew it now. Of the 13 current members of the EC, 12 were willing to carry on, and were elected unanimously. The EC would therefore be as follows for the period 2011-2012:
- Fermin Alcoba (ex-WTO)
- Jamshid Anvar (ex-UNHCR/UN)
- Catherine Bertrand (ex-UNHCR)
- Alberto Campeas (ex-WTO)
- Jean Erhardt (ex-City of Geneva)
- René Kirszbaum (ex-ILO)
- Paul Rolian (ex-WTO)
- Neel Mani (ex-WHO)
- Jean-
- Christina Schröder (ex-WTO)
The EC was tasked with recruiting new members to its ranks.
11. Other business Information: Members were kept informed about the activities of the Association through a newsletter issued in the course of the year, and it did not seem efficient to do this more frequently. But in addition, news was posted on the website (www.greycells.ch), and perhaps more could be done with this medium, and to encourage members to consult the site more regularly.
Tribute: The Assembly wished to record its gratitude to Fermin Alcoba and René Kirszbaum for their untiring efforts as Presidents of the Association to date, and generally to the EC for its efforts on behalf of the Association. It expressed its appreciation to Rosemary for presiding over the meeting in such an effective manner.
General Assembly, Thursday, 9 December 2010
List of Participants
NAME EMAIL ADDRESS
Fermin Alcoba This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Jamshid Anvar This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Paul Bailey This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Catherine Bertrand This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Yves Beigbeder This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Alberto Campeas This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Jacques Chabert This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Jean Erhardt This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
René Kirszbaum This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Neel Mani This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Jack Martin This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Claude Mercier This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Wolfgang Milzow This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Marco Pautasso This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
K.M. Patwary This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Jean-Claude Piers This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Rosemary Ribes This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Paul Rolian This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Christina Schröder This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Werner Sengenberger This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Mehdi Shafaeddin This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Per Sjögren This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
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