IFMS Terms of Reference

Preamble.

The issues, challenges and solutions facing the meteorological societies around the world have many global commonalities.  Yet, there exists no global forum for them to readily share their experiences and identify opportunities; today’s inter-society interactions are primarily bilateral (apart from those among several regional societies).  A representative cross-section consisting of 20 of the world’s meteorological societies convened in a planning meeting held January 13, 2009, in Phoenix, Arizona, USA, to consider establishing an International Forum of Meteorological Societies that would address issues of common concern.  One mechanism for achieving the Forum’s goals would be a series of occasional meetings of representatives of the world’s national and regional meteorological societies. Those participating in the planning meeting indicated broad and enthusiastic support for the Forum concept.

Terms of Reference.

The IFMS will not have official or legal status; it will function primarily as a forum to facilitate communication among the member societies for the broad purpose of facilitating the exchange of knowledge, experience and information among the world’s national and regional meteorological societies, and to encourage follow-through on action items identified by the member societies.

A few examples of topics of common concern to IFMS members are :

1. Coping with the rapid evolution of society publications and associated inflationary costs of print journals
2. The role of meteorological societies in global climate change: from education and communication to policy
3. The role of meteorological societies in coping with the impacts of severe natural weather hazards: education, planning, adaptation and response
4. Trends in society membership
1. Sector trends: academia, government, industry
2. Retention of student members upon graduation
3. Entraining professional in affiliated hard and soft sciences
5. Domestic outreach – the role of the meteorological society in informing and educating professional and the general public
6. International outreach – are there missed opportunities?
7. Sharing of educational resources
8. Sharing experiences in improving service delivery in and among the various sectors

Membership in the IFMS is voluntary and open to all national and regional meteorological and closely-related professional/scientific societies that have a significant meteorological focus.

The IFMS Steering Committee will receive and act on written requests from meteorological societies for membership in the IFMS.  Such letters must be submitted by an officer of the requesting meteorological society.  Membership in the IFMS shall not be unreasonably denied.  A notice of eligibility for membership in the IFMS will be posted on the IFMS web site, and will include instructions for submitting applications to the IFMS Steering Committee.  Furthermore, the IFMS web site will include the names and contact information for all IFMS member societies.

The IFMS will convene in occasional global meetings of the member societies.  It is anticipated that global meetings of the IFMS will occur every two years.  The meeting venue will be set by the members at the time of the previous global meeting.  Societies interested in hosting a future meeting will need to indicate their intention to the Steering Committee at least one month in advance of the preceding global meeting.

The agenda for global meetings will be the joint responsibility of the Steering Committee and the host society.  The host society and the Steering Committee will be jointly responsible for publishing a summary of each global meeting in an appropriate meteorological journal or bulletin with international distribution.

At the IFMS planning meeting, it was agreed that the inaugural Global Meeting of the IFMS will be hosted by the American Meteorological Society and will take place in conjunction with the 90th Annual Meeting of the American Meteorological Society (17-21 January 2010, in Atlanta, Georgia)

The IFMS will encourage and facilitate communications among its members. For example, the IFMS should pursue establishing an open Forum website that would be hosted by one of its member societies.  The Steering Committee, in conjunction with the hosting Society, will establish guidelines for content.

The Steering Committee will consist of six-to-eight members with at least one representative from Africa, Asia, Europe, North America, South America, and Oceania.  The Steering Committee will conduct its business by occasional electronic or telephonic meetings and make available to all members a summary of those meetings.  Steering Committee members will serve no more than two consecutive terms, each term lasting a period equal to the interval between successive global IFMS meetings. Terms will begin and end with successive global meetings.  Rotation will be such that approximately half the members will be new members and approximately half will be members in their second term.  The IFMS Steering Committee members will select their chairperson.  Nominations for Steering Committee members may be made by any member IFMS society; nominations will be submitted to the Steering Committee at least three months prior to the next global IFMS meeting, and a ballot will be submitted to the members for a vote at the global meeting.

Steering Committee decisions will be reached by consensus whenever possible; where consensus cannot be reached, then decisions will be made by a simple majority vote of the full Steering Committee membership; written proxies will be recognized.

Occasionally, issues may come before the full membership for a decision.  In those cases, decisions of the IFMS will be reached by consensus whenever possible; where consensus cannot be reached, then decisions will be made by a simple majority vote of the member societies present, provided there is a quorum (where a quorum consists of a simple majority).  Each society will have one vote.  In extraordinary cases, voting by electronic mail will be permissible.

No actions taken by the Steering Committee or the IFMS shall be construed as requiring any member society to assume an obligation.  Rather, decisions of the IFMS represent a non-binding sense of the global societies.

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