Santiago, Chile - October 27th and 31st 2002

DRAFT MINUTES - FINAL

ATTENDANCE LIST

COUNCIL MEMBERS

Felipe Urresta President SIM, INEN
Ismael Castelazo Chairman SIM TC, CENAM
Yoshito Mitani, Chairman, SIM PDC, CENAM
Hratch Semerjian SIM/JCRB Representative, NIST
Steve Carpenter Technical Advisor, NIST
José A. Dajes Castro Coordinator ANDIMET, INDECOPI
Luis Mussio Coordinator SURAMET, LATU
Evelyn de Vanegas On behalf of Coordinator CAMET
Hermon Edmondson Coordinator CARIMET, BSJ
Paulo Ferracioli SIM Secretariat, INMETRO
João Jornada On behalf of Past President
Armando Mariante, INMETRO
Taynah Lopes de Souza SIM Recording Secretary, INMETRO

OBSERVERS
Janusz Lusztyk NRC, Canada
Dianne Lalla-Rodrigues ABBS, Antigua and Barbuda
Hector Herrera OAS
Raul Núñez INN, Chile

AGENDA
1. Introduction and Welcome / Introdución y Bienvenida
2. Verification of Quorum / Verificación de Quórum
3. Approval of Agenda / Aprobación de Agenda
4. Approval of the Minutes from previous Council Meeting / Aprobación de la Acta de la Reunión Anterior del Consejo
5. Matters arising from the Minutes / Asuntos derivados de la Acta
6. Progress on General Assembly Organization / Progreso en la Organización de la Asamblea General
7. Discussion and Election of SIM Officers during General Assembly / Discusión y Elección de los Representantes del SIM durante la Asamblea General
8. Other Business / Otros Asuntos

Meeting:

1. Introduction and Welcome / Introdución y Bienvenida
President Felipe Urresta welcomed the Council Members.

2. Verification of Quorum / Verificación de Quórum
The quorum was verified, eleven members of Council being present.

3. Approval of Agenda / Aprobación de la Agenda
The agenda was approved with no amendments.

4. Approval of the minutes from previous Council Meeting
The minutes were approved without amendments.

5. Matters arising from the minutes
The Council decided to send a letter for Janusz Luztyk, NRC and Karen Brown, NIST to congratulate them on their position at CIPM.

6. Progress on General Assembly
Raul Nuñez reported on the organization of the GA and related activities during the SIM Week in Santiago.
Ismael Castelazo suggested to make a certain specialization on the presentations, specially between Ismael Castelazo and Yoshito Mitani, to avoid duplication.
The GA shall be divided in blocks and a new agenda will be made, more detailed. First there will be the presentation of reports of SIM Representatives in the morning. In the second block during the afternoon, there will be the presentation of Sub-region reports. On the second day, there will be the election for President. Right after the GA we shall have another Council Meeting.

7. Discussion and Election of SIM Officers during General Assembly
It was decided that the Secretary would prepare the ballot paper for elections - secret ballots in accordance to SIM Statutes.

8. Other Business
Hratch Semerjian presented the document "End of Transition Period of CIPM MRA - Review of Published CMCs", explaining that Quality Systems should be implemented to support CMC by the end of 2003 which is the end of the transition period.
The following resolution was approved:

Resolution 07/02: A task force will be set up to review QS implementations in SIM members for the purpose of the CIPM MRA, which will be formed by CIPM-MRA signatories and chaired by the SIM representative to JCRB.
Some additional comments were made:
The task force reports its findings on the acceptability to the Council. Council shall report its findings to the JCRB.
Any SIM Member can request the review of their QS, even if they are not yet signatories of the MRA.
A meeting to review QS of NMIs will be held at least once a year. This meeting will be open to all SIM Members and observers from other RMOs, and will provide the opportunity for discussion and comments.
Luis Mussio then mentioned that SIM was the only region which made no presentation at NCSLI this year. He also mentioned that the best person to prepare this presentation should be the president Felipe Urresta, who agreed. Luis Mussio informed that December is the deadline to prepare a presentation for NCSLI for next year. The following resolution was approved by the Council:

Resolution 08/02: Felipe Urresta will prepare the SIM presentation to the next NCSLI Meeting in Tampa, FL.

Steve Carpenter proposed to include NCSLI as a Council Member no voting rights. The Council approved this proposal and it will be ratified at the GA. It was stated that there's no need to change the Statutes as they will have no voting rights. Council approved the following resolution:

Resolution 09/02: Make an official invitation to NCSLI to participate at the SIM Council as an observer.

Dianne Lalla-Rodriguez mentioned their interest of having a meeting in Antigua & Barbuda. She was informed that she should make a formal request and then it will be decided.
Luis Mussio expressed the necessity of having a person to make the translation of NCSLI documents. Taynah Souza expressed the same interest related to the translation of SIM web site into Spanish. Luis Mussio will try to solve this question within the Documentation Working Group.

Having no further business the meeting was adjourned for Thursday (or Friday), after the GA.

SIM Council Meeting
October 31st , 2002
Neruda Hotel
Santiago - Chile

DRAFT MINUTES

ATTENDANCE LIST

COUNCIL MEMBERS

Felipe Urresta President SIM, INEN
Ismael Castelazo Chairman SIM TC, CENAM
Yoshito Mitani, Chairman, SIM PDC, CENAM
Hratch Semerjian SIM/JCRB Representative, NIST
Steve Carpenter Technical Advisor, NIST
Oscar Harasic SIM Executive Secretary, OAS
José A. Dajes Castro Coordinator ANDIMET, INDECOPI
Luis Mussio Coordinator SURAMET, LATU
Carlos R. Ochoa Coordinator CAMET, CONACYT
Hermon Edmondson Coordinator CARIMET, BSJ
Janusz Lusztyk Coordinator NORAMET, NRC
Paulo Ferracioli SIM Secretariat, INMETRO
João Jornada On behalf of Past President
Armando Mariante, INMETRO

OBSERVERS
Ed Nemeroff NCSLI
Dianne Lalla Rodrígues ABBS, Antigua & Barbuda
Hector Laiz INTI, Argentina
Taynah Lopes de Souza SIM Secretariat, Inmetro, Brazil
Anselm Gittens SLBS, St. Lucia
Theodore Reddock TTBS, Trinidad & Tobago
Willie May NIST, USA
Haygas Salustian Sencamer, Venezuela
Alexis Valqui PTB, Germany

AGENDA
1. Introduction and Welcome / Introdución y Bienvenida
2. Verification of Quorum / Verificación de Quórum
3. Approval of Agenda / Aprobación de Agenda
4. Future Activities / Atividades Futuras
5. Matters arising from the General Assembly / Asuntos derivados de la Asamblea General
6. Other Business / Otros Asuntos

Meeting:

1. Introduction and Welcome / Introdución y Bienvenida
Felipe Urresta, the re-elected President, welcomed the Council Members.

2. Verification of Quorum / Verificación de Quórum
The quorum was verified, thirteen members of Council being present.

3. Approval of Agenda / Aprobación de la Agenda
The agenda was approved without amendments.

4. Future Activities / Actividades Futuras
Next meetings were established as follows:
1) Council Meeting and Quality System Meeting in Antigua & Barbuda, in January 14-16.
2) Quality System Meeting in Ottawa, Canada, during the last week of May (28-30).
3) NCSL Meeting and Council Meeting in Florida, in August 17-22.
4) General Assembly in Panama, in September, probably between 14th and 19th, to be confirmed by members in a week.

5. Matters arising from the General Assembly / Asuntos derivados de la Asamblea General
Felipe Urresta asked Hector Laiz about the possibility of INTI publishing SIM magazine "Infosim". Hector Laiz said he will check it at INTI and will probably have a response next week. Felipe Urresta then stated that INEN shall be the second option in case INTI can not publish it.
Luis Mussio raised a discussion about the budget, as he said that there's US$ 5,000.00 left and the Council has to decide what to do with it. Ismael Castelazo talked about TC's expenses. Steve Carpenter and Luis Mussio shall make a clearer calculation of what's left and what can be done with the money and they'll present it in the next Council Meeting.
Willie May talked about the PTB-SIM Project in Chemistry. He made a clarification about the request for PTB's support, of US$ 250,000.00. Steve Carpenter and Felipe Urresta asked about the division of funds between PTB and SIM within this program, which Willie May explained that shall still be decided.
As the PTB-SIM Project is divided between Accreditation and Chemical Metrology, some members of the Council mentioned that it would be interesting to know what amount shall be appointed to each area. SIM has to decide how to spend the money, but there is no plan yet.
Alexis Valqui from PTB was invited to take part at the Council Meeting in order to clarify some points related to the PTB-SIM Project. He first explained that the Project was approved in Germany and the money is already reserved. He also explained that in accordance to the proposal made by SIM, there'll be four workshops: One in each Sub-region (except for NORAMET) that shall be paid by the Project. The Sub-regions will have to decide when to have them.
Then he explained that the Project was built for a period of five years, what means that within this period we'll have the four workshops. The Project also covers two comparisons per Sub-region. It must be decided in which areas these comparisons shall be held.
Janusz Luztyk then mentioned that the budget approved was of 750,000.00 euros (for both Accreditation and Chemical Metrology). The limits are around 200,000.00 euros for Accreditation and 550,000.00 for Chemical Metrology, discounting the overhead.
Willie May explained that after the Chemical Metrology Working Group Meeting tomorrow, he'll have a better idea of the detailed budget. However, the detailed budget will probably be ready within one month and shall be discussed on the next council meeting.
Steve Carpenter raised the question of OAS's role in the Project. He mentioned that funds from OAS will be further reduced. It'll then be difficult to get OAS funds for Chemistry as they'll say we already have a program with PTB.
Within this point, Hratch Semerjian also mentioned that OAS will pay attention to where the money is going and that it's important that the money effectively goes to developing countries, and the picture must be one that shows complementation between OAS funds and PTB funds.
Then João Jornada expressed his concern about SIM interactions with laboratories. He proposed a resolution stipulating that all interaction between SIM and other organizations should have the endorsement of the signatory NMI.
Hratch Semerjian and Steve Carpenter intervened, saying that this question should not be discussed at that moment as they could see no connection between the themes. They said the Council should remain discussing PTB-SIM Project.
Then João Jornada said that this matter is very much connected with PTB-SIM Project as he's afraid that the Project could foster direct interaction between SIM and Chemical laboratories in the SIM countries, without the coordination of the NMIs, which is the very representative of the countries at SIM. This could weaken the role of NMI in coordinating and representing the metrology of their countries. He pointed out that PTB interacts directly with Inmetro in Brazil, thus helping Inmetro in its role of coordinating the primary metrology in the country. Steve Carpenter mentioned that in his opinion it does not happen that a certain institution gets involved in any process without the awareness of NMI. Hermon Edmondson then confirmed that it does happen sometimes in CARIMET.
Supporting João Jornada's position Janusz Luztyk made an intervention and explained in his point of view how the question was indeed related to the discussion of PTB-SIM Project.
João Jornada then affirmed that if this subject was not discussed, Brazilian position would be against PTB-SIM Project. He wanted more clarification on the interaction of SIM with other organizations, emphasizing that this issue should be brought up to the NMI's analysis.
The matter was then discussed among the Council and the following resolution was proposed and then unanimously approved:

Resolution10/02: SIM interactions shall be conducted only with the member organization (usually the NMI) or designated laboratories.
SIM representatives shall send to the secretariat an updated list of designated laboratories and contact persons. It is the responsibility of the members to keep this list updated.

The Council then started a discussion on whether the PTB money should come straight from PTB to SIM or if it should come from PTB to OAS to manage the funds and transfer the money to SIM. The following resolution was proposed and approved:

Resolution11/02: SIM Council welcomes the offer of the German Government, communicated by PTB, to provide partial funding for SIM activities in the area of Chemical Metrology.
SIM Council recommends that an MOU between OAS and the German Government be signed.
SIM Council also suggests that, consistent with the normal mode of operation of SIM, funds be transferred to the OAS Office of Science and Technology for disbursement to SIM member countries in accordance with the approved program plan.

6. Other Business / Otros Asuntos

IAAC
Ismael Castelazo clarified that the problem related to IAAC is an internal question between EMA and CENAM that has no impact on metrology issues.
The other question raised was about whether or not inviting IAAC to be an associate member of SIM. The Council discussed this possibility and it was agreed that they shall continue being invited to the GA, but just as a guest.
Hermon Edmondson then asked the Council to study the possibility of formalizing CARIMET participation at CROSQ (Caribbean Regional Organization for Standards and Quality). The idea was that JBS would represent SIM in this forum.
Hermon Edmondson also clarified that there's no duplication between SIM and CROSQ and that SIM should become a member of it.
Ed Nemeroff gave the idea of making a letter to designate JBS as a liaison delegate so that CARIMET can take part at CROSQ's meetings. Hermon Edmondson will check other details on this matter and then will work with Felipe Urresta on the draft letter.
Jose Dajes then expressed his interest (shared by other Sub-regions as CAMET and CARIMET) in taking part at BIPM and other organizations for whom they have to pay fees and they haven't got enough resources. Jose Dajes suggested that SIM could prepare a letter to try to get more clarification on the rules of such organizations. Felipe Urresta raised the possibility of having a regional membership. Ismael Castelazo expressed doubts on the feasibility of this request as the General Conference of Weights and Measures (CGPM) is the only body that can grant this request. The Director of the BIPM must follow the resolutions of the 21st CGPM, where the contributions of Associates are based on their GDP.

Having no more points to be discussed the session was closed.