Agriculture and Environment Interest Group

January-June 2002

Six-monthly report to the Board of Directors

Our Group has a membership of 126, and we have 96 subscribers to our e-list. The e-list has been a useful means of sharing information, and was particularly useful in initiating and sustaining a discussion on the situation regarding the indexing of agricultural and environmental information in Australia. The group's lobbying was a factor in having the status of ABOA reviewed and its importance confirmed. This really emphasised for us the importance of having a group devoted to agricultural and environmental information workers.

After lengthy negotiation, we organised a lunchtime get-together at the Online2003 conference. Katie Blake spoke on web publishing, and there was a discussion on the future of ABOA. We were astonished to be told there was a considerable cost to use a room for this meeting. Thanks to Georgina Dale, funding was provided by ALIA for this purpose. However, it is our strong belief that conference committees have an obligation to assist ALIA groups by making space available for groups to meet during conferences. Although it took a lot of negotiation, we have now been allocated a room for the Adelaide Specials conference.

The change in arrangements for the NPC caught us by surprise last year. We were assured that more notice and time for discussion would be provided in 2003, but again feel that the arrangements are rather last minute. We would protest once again that these arrangements need to be built in to the calendar early in the year, especially when people will need to travel to attend a gathering. However, we do appreciate the efforts of Joanne Fuller in contacting all groups in NSW to set up a meeting in Sydney and hope one of our members will be able to attend.

We are currently sending out a print newsletter to contact all our members and seek comment and ideas for our group's direction, as well as nominations for office-bearers. Some suggestions so far are to set up a mentoring scheme within the group, and to highlight a particular library each month on our web page on the ALIA website.

Marsha Reilly
Convenor

John Elias
Secretary/treasurer