IAL Council Meeting Sept. 2000

General Meeting Sept. 2000

General Meeting - Honouring

General Meeting - Closing Session

Address of the new President

New Constitution

Activities of the New Council

IAL endorses Scientific Events

Treasurer's Report

Dues for 2001-2004

IAL Donation Fund

IAL Council Meeting (Barcelona, 5 September 2000)

The sessionīs opening was at 4.15 pm - Attendants present: M. Jahns (President, Member of the Constitution Committee), D. Fahselt (Vice-President), E. Farkas (Treasurer), F. Lutzoni (Assistant Treasurer), P.L. Nimis (Editor), D. Triebel (Secretary), X. Llimona (Member-at-large, Secretary of IAL4), P. de Priest (Member-at-large), G. Kantvilas (Member-at-large), S. Ott (Member-at-large), T. Randlane (Member-at-large), L. Sancho (Member-at-large).

The agenda was proposed and accepted. The President stated that he would ask members for donations in addition to their membership fees at the general meeting. Donors will be given a receipt in additon to that for their membership fees. The Treasurer delivered a short report about the current financial status of the IAL. The schedule and topics of the General Meeting were discussed. Some minor changes were suggested, i.e., presentation and voting of the site for IAL5 Symposium in 2004 was placed directly after the voting for the Constitution. Sieglinde Ott withdrew her candidacy for Secretary and Tiina Randlane pointed out that she would stay as candidate for a Member-at-large if the proposal to hold the next IAL5 Symposium and General Meeting in Tartu should fail. (If Tartu is chosen she would automatically be an officer of the next Council.) The importance of ratifying the new constitution in the General Meeting was emphasized. Furthermore the necessity for the Nominations Committee, Advisory Board and limiting the number of members-at-large to three was presented by the President and the Editor. At the General Meeting, Mats Wedin will deliver the report of the Constitution Committee and Christoph Scheidegger the report of the Conservation Committee. It was agreed that the vote for the new constitution would be by a showing of hands but voting for the venue for IAL5 as well as the new Council would be by preprinted ballots. Presuming the new constitution is accepted, it will be effective immediately. Finally, editorial standards for the publication of IAL4 contributions in Bibliotheca Lichenologica were discussed. Two editors should be responsible for organizing this special volume: Mireia Giralt, Thorsten Lumbsch and Sieglinde Ott were suggested for this task. The President closed the session at 6.15 p.m.

IAL General Meeting (Barcelona, 6 September 2000)

The sessionīs opening was at 6.00 pm - Council Officers present: M. Jahns (President, Member of the Constitution Committee), D. Fahselt (Vice-President), E. Farkas (Treasurer), F. Lutzoni (Assistant Treasurer), P.L. Nimis (Editor), D. Triebel (Secretary), X. Llimona (Member-at-large, Secretary of IAL4), P. de Priest (Member-at-large), G. Kantvilas (Member-at-large), S. Ott (Member-at-large), T. Randlane (Member-at-large), L. Sancho (Member-at-large). IAL members attending: about 150.

The President recollected the General Meeting four years ago in Salzburg noting that the IAL had become a relatively large association which, therefore, needed a more structured organization for the General Meetings. For this reason, election ballots were introduced for the first time. The agenda was presented. T. Ahti the addition of a discussion on organization of excursions by the IAL (see below). The "Report of the Conservation Committee" and "Presentation of the proposals for the site of IAL5; voting" were interchanged for organizational reasons. The Agenda was then accepted.

The President stated that the IAL currently has limited special tasks. Most projects (i.e., excursions, congresses) are organized by local lichenological societies. This situation had a major influence on the discussion of the new constitution over the past four years. The main task of the IAL is to improve communication between lichenologists that is presently successfully accomplished by the IAL Newsletter and the online discussion forum within the lichens-l listserver. The IAL Conservation Committee has an important function linking the IAL with international institutions of nature conservation. The President emphasized that, in future, the IAL should have more financial possibilities to support members of poorer countries and especially students to attend meetings and excursions. To meet the costs of such a program the President called for donations at the meeting and started by giving a personal donation. A list circulated during this general meeting. The result of this appeal will be published in the next volume of the ILN.

The Secretary reported that the IAL has more than 500 current members (22 of them institutional) from more than 60 countries. The association itself is a Scientific member of IABMS (International Association of Botanical and Mycological Societies) and of IUBS (International Union of Biological Sciences). The secretary participated in the meeting of the Board of IABMS at IBC16 in St Louis, USA. The main topics were a decision on the site of the XVII International Botanical Congress and the election of Chairman and Secretary. The IAL council suggested Ingvar Kärnefelt and Christoph Scheidegger as candidates for officers of the next Executive Committee of the IUBS. IAL is also an institutional member of IMA (International Mycological Association). Pier Luigi Nimis is currently a member of the Executive Committee of the IMA.

After the IAL3 congress in Salzburg 1996, there were three informal or council meetings of the IAL. One informal meeting was held in Jerusalem, August 1998 (16 IAL members present), one council meeting in St Louis, August 1999 (7 members present), one council meeting in Venice, May 2000 (8 members present). The minutes were published in ILN 31(2), 1998, ILN 32(2), 1999 and ILN 33(1), 2000.

The Treasurer delivered the financial report which was slightly modified from the report published in ILN 33(1), 2000.

Mats Wedin (Member of the Constitution Commmittee) delivered the Report of the Constitution Committee and presented the final proposal for a new constitution, as published in ILN 33(1), 2000. Mats Wedin briefly discussed several important new elements of the proposal - the number of Council officers, the composition of the Council and the introduction of a Nomination Committee and of an Advisory Board. David Hawksworth noted that the Constitution should include the President and Secretary automatically be representives to the IUBS. Josef Hafellner suggested to change §7 for allowing voting by mail. The proposal was discussed and then voted on by a show of hands; the proposal was defeated. The wording of Article 10 was discussed; a proposal to delete the last two sentences of the Article failed. The new Constitution was accepted unanimously and its immediate adoption approved.

Tiina Randlane briefly repeated the proposal that IAL5 be convened in Tartu (Estonia) in 2004; see ILN 33(1), 2000. She stated that a vote for this proposal would strongly support the East European lichenological community as Tartu would organize the symposium in cooperation with Russian and Ukrainean lichenologists. Tom Nash III apologized the late candidature of Tempe (Arizona, U.S.A.) as he had been in Europe for the year and had been unable to discuss the proposal with his associates in a timely manner. He pointed out that until now all IAL meetings took place in Europe. Therefore it might be appropriate to hold the next one in North America. The University of Arizona would organize the meeting together with the University of Mexico. A number of excursions to certain regions of Arizona, Mexico and Baja California were possible but as yet undefined. In 2004, at least parts of the Lichen Flora of the Sonoran Region will be published and this flora will be useful for lichenological field trips there. The best season for the symposium in Arizona would be spring (Easter time). The venue for IAL5 was put to the vote; Tartu-86, Tempe-51, one abstention.

Christoph Scheidegger delivered the Conservation Committee report. The committee is called "The International Commmittee for the Conservation of lichens" (ICCL) and it is associated with IUCN constituting the Lichens Group. Christoph Scheidegger is Chairman, Cliff Smith Vice Chairman and Pat Wolseley Secretary with about 25 persons as members representing almost every region in the world. The principal activities over the last four years were intervention in the protection of Erioderma pedicellatum and two workshops on lichen conservation. The main future activities will be to work on the IUCN-Red list (co-ordinator Cliff Smith; with Christoph Scheidegger) and on the Conservation Action Plan (co-ordinator Christoph Scheidegger; with Cliff Smith and Pat Wolseley).

The President introduced the nominees for Council Officers 2000-2004 noting that the list was already published in ILN 33(1), 2000. He amended the list as follows: S. Ott has withdrawn her candidacy and T. Randlane as the Organizing Secretary of IAL5 was automatically an Officer of the next Council and, therefore, no longer a candidate for Member-at-Large. The ballots were cast and counted. The results were announced at the end of the meeting, published at the notice board next day and officially announced at the Closing Session: Pier Luigi Nimis -- President, Irwin Brodo -- Vice-President, Leopoldo Sancho -- Secretary, Francois Lutzoni -- Treasurer, Christoph Scheidegger -- Assistant Treasurer, Martin Grube -- Editor and John A. Elix, Rosmarie Honegger and Gintaras Kantvilas -- Members-at-large. Robert Egan -- Auditor, Helmut Mayrhofer -- Vice-Auditor. Peter Crittenden, Helmut Mayrhofer and Bruce McCune were elected to form the Nominating Committee. Because of the late time, it was decided to adjourn the General Meeting and reconvene it just before the start of the IAL dinner when the remaining agenda topics - "Presentation of the Acharius Medals" and "Awarding of the Mason Hale Award" - would be presented.

Teuvo Ahti suggested that the IAL should organize additional field meetings before the next congress 2004. He offered his cooperation to organize one in Sri Lanka or one in Canada (New Foundland) where the local lichenologists would cooperate. Martin Grube asked for proposals of lichenological symposia for the International Botanical Congress (IBC17) in Wien 2005. David Hawksworth requested proposals for lichenological symposia for the International Mycological Congress in Oslo 2002. The session closed at 7.45 p.m.

IAL General Meeting - Honouring (Barcelona, 7 September 2000)

This General Meeting adjourned the previous evening was continued the next evening just prior to the IAL banquet located at "El Petit Miau" Restaurant, Maremagnum at 9.00 p.m. President Martin Jahns welcomed the participants and proceeded to Agenda Item 8 "Honouring of the Acharius medalists". The Acharius medalists for 2000 were Teuvo T. Ahti, Georges A. Clauzade and Nina Siergeovna Golubkova. The nomination proposal for each medalists was presented by Ana Burgaz, Xavier Llimona and Yuri Kotlov respectively (see separate publications in the next ILN). These awards were followed by the "Mason Hale Award". There were six proposals and the unanimous choice of the Council was Jolanta M. Miadlikowska (Gdansk, Poland) for her outstanding work resulting from a doctoral dissertation "Revision of the genus Peltigera (Peltigerineae, Ascomycota) in Poland based on a world-wide phylogenetic synthesis of morphological, chemical and molecular data". Congratulations to all!

Closing Session of the IAL4 Symposium (Barcelona, 8 September 2000)

The closing session started at 6.00 p.m. The President announced the New Council and congratulated the new officers. He thanked the convenors of the sessions for their engagement und the local Organizing Committee as well as the technical staff for the excellent realization of the IAL4 Symposium in Barcelona. Pier Luigi Nimis, the new President gave the following address. The session closed at 7.00 p.m.

Dagmar Triebel, Munich

Address of the new President at IAL4 (Barcelona, 8 September 2000)

Any new President - I suppose - is eagerly expected to propagate Urbi et Orbi.his more or less revolutionary Presidential ideas. So, here it is, my Presidential program of 212 pages!

...Well, the faces I see in the audience do perhaps suggest that I should keep it shorter...

In my opinion: a) we should try to be more active in the international scientific arena, b) we should try to have much closer links with the national/regional societies, c) we should try to be of some use for lichenologists worldwide. - This is it. - However, could we imagine these sentences with a "not" after every "should"? Better then to go straight to the really important topic: the "Soul" of our Association.

On one hand, modern Biology tends towards specialization, on the other hand the recognition of basic similarities in all biological processes is disrupting the traditional boundaries of "taxonomical" disciplines. Lichenology is no exception to this. Lichens are nothing else but a group of fungi with a funny behaviour. Most of the molecular, ecological, and physiological talks at IAL4 could have been presented in other types of biological symposia - and in front of much wider and diversified audiences. Why then do "Lichenologists" still stay together? Of course, because they love their Lichens, as much such so as the members of I.A.L.A. (International Association of the Lovers of Artichokes) love the culinary properties of certain hypertrophic flowers. Does I.A.L. resemble to I.A.L.A.? No, for sure, but this has to do more with our history than with our love for lichens.

Lichenology reached its Nadir during the World War 2, when a handful of persons only - mostly in the refugium of the Scandinavian fortress - still maintained an active interest in lichens. After the War, and quite unexpectedly, there was a veritable boom. A second generation appeared, pupils of a few Masters - mostly classical taxonomists - who, despite the difficult times, knew each other well, and who shared a common cultural background. Fortunately for us, these were true Masters, capable of pushing forward their pupils beyond lichen taxonomy and out into all sorts of possible directions. The fourth or fifth generation has now shown up in Barcelona, but our roots and our common language are still here.

Many years ago, as a reluctant newcomer to a meeting of B.L.A.M, I felt like Paul in Damascus. As a would-be numerical ecologist I could scarcely distinguish a Xanthoria from a liverwort. Because of my late arrival in that small Austrian village, Josef Poelt immediately directed me - with a glass of beer - to a table where several people were having a lively discussion on how to distinguish Hypogymnia physodes from crooked forms of related species. The naughty boy felt proud having identified at once the sub-tribe of Biologists who were hosting him. After a few minutes, however, he started feeling confused. A man with a beard said something about low photosynthetic rates of Hypogymnia in polluted areas. A fat, bald man replied that metal contamination could also play a role. A blonde lady maintained that according to SEM and TEM most metals lie outside the algal layer. Then, the discussion moved to the evolution of Hypogymnia, its possible centres of origin, its mechanisms of evolution in relation to reproductive strategies, and - believe it or not - to the possibilities opened by DNA-analyses for answering some of these questions. The naughty boy went to bed like a dog with his tail between his legs, and in the morning he came to the bold conclusion that lichenologists were "unusual". This is - more or less - why he is now writing these lines.

IAL4 was a mirror of my earliest experience in the world of Lichenology: a firework, dazzling us with a too bright and diversified palette of topics to be able to fit into a single parish of modern Biology. Outside the main hall - until late at night - an unusual mixture of elders and babies, of ecologists and physiologists, of moleculars and non-moleculars was sharing knowledge and experience. Even those from the sixth generation have enjoyed a rare event, an "added value" brought by History to our apparently outdated discipline, the cross-fertilization within Biology-at-large. The "soul" of our Society - that which makes it different from I.A.L.A. - was there, floating above the tables of Catalonian restaurants. My main responsibility, and that of the new Council, will be that of keeping alive this spirit of shared history - this "soul". However, the development of a modern Biological culture from a solid historical ground does not - and cannot - depend on Presidents and Councils: it depends on the joined efforts of all of us, it is something we must all nurture.

Pier Luigi Nimis, President

§ 1. Name - The name of the Association is the International Association for Lichenology (IAL).

§ 2. Goals - The purpose of the IAL is to promote the understanding of lichens and lichenology world-wide. To achieve this, the IAL shall: a) encourage the study of lichens, b) advocate lichenological interests in the international arena, c) stimulate communication and discussion among those interested in lichens, d) organise symposia, field meetings, conferences, etc., and e) support the conservation of lichens. The IAL is affiliated to the International Union of Biological Sciences (IUBS).

§ 3. Membership - Members of the IAL are those, whose dues have been paid. Any member who is more than two years in arrears in payment may be suspended by the Council.

§ 4. Power to raise Money -The IAL exists only for non-profit status. It has the power to raise money by dues or other means as approved by the Council, but only for scientific purposes, awards and the administration of the Society.

§ 5. Dues - Membership dues will be determined at the general meeting of the IAL, upon advice of the Council.

§ 6. Officers, Auditors and Nominating Committee - The elected Officers of the IAL are a President, a Vice-President, a Secretary, a Treasurer, an Assistant Treasurer, an Editor, the organizer of the next IAL Congress, and three Council members-at-large. These officers form the Council of the IAL. The Auditor and Vice-Auditor are elected non-Council members. The Nominating Committee is composed of three elected non-Council members, and they elect a secretary among themselves. The term for Officers, Auditors and Nominating Committee is four years. The maximum period for any Council Officer, Auditor and Nominating Committee member is two consecutive terms. Council Officers, with the sole exception of the Editor, cannot serve more than one consecutive term in the same position.

§ 7. Nomination and election of Officers, Auditors and Nominating Committee - The Nominating Committee must publish a call for nominations in the IAL Newsletter at least one year prior to the general meeting. Any member of the IAL may submit nominations or be nominated. Nominations, to be valid, need the written consent of the nominees, and need to reach the Nominating Committee at least two months prior to the general meeting. Nominations from the floor at general meetings are allowed only when no nominee for a given post is elected. Elections will be made by majority vote at the IAL general meeting. Voting will take place irrespective of the number of nominees for a post.

8. Duties of Officers and Auditor - The Council administers the affairs and funds of IAL and shall meet or in other ways communicate as decided by the President or at the request by Council Officers. The Council must establish an Advisory Board including a representative selection of lichenologists worldwide, with special attention to local societies, which shall assist the Council in the transfer and dissemination of information. The Council nominates two representatives of the IAL to the IUBS. The Council may designate Committees that shall manage topics of particular relevance for lichenology. The Advisory Board and the Committees will last until the next Council takes over. The President, or in his absence the Vice-President, or any member of Council designated by the President, shall preside at all meetings of IAL and the Council. The Secretary shall keep minutes of meetings, and shall conduct correspondence as requested by Council. The council nominates two representatives of IAL in the IUBS. The Treasurer, or in her/his absence the Assistant Treasurer, shall keep an account of all receipts and expenditures and have a statement presented at general meetings and as requested by Council. The Assistant Treasurer shall assist the Treasurer as requested by the Council. The Editor shall prepare the International Lichenological Newsletter, whose content and format shall be at his/her discretion subject to review and recommendation of Council. The Council may temporarily fill positions vacated between elections. If less than seven elected members remain, a new Council must be elected at an additional general meeting. To be valid, decisions of Council - held by a majority vote - require that all Council members have been informed, and that at least six of them participated. The Auditor, assisted by the Vice-Auditor, will review the financial records of the IAL and present a report to the general meeting. In her/his absence, the Vice-Auditor will act as Auditor. The Nominating Committee is responsible for presenting a list of nominations to the general meeting.

§ 9. General Meetings - The IAL shall hold its general meeting at the IAL Congress, a major international congress covering all aspects of lichenology, to be organized every fourth year. Announcements of additional meetings must reach the membership at least six months in advance. Any member can address topics for discussion to the Secretary at least four months prior to the general meeting, so that these will be disseminated to the Membership before the meeting. Additions to the agenda require a two-thirds majority of those present at the general meeting. Decisions will be taken by a majority vote. To be valid, a general meeting requires the participation of at least 10% of the membership.

§ 10. Awards - At least two awards should be assigned: an award recognising excellence in research by young lichenologists for outstanding work resulting from doctoral dissertations or similar studies (Mason Hale Award), and, b) a medal recognising the life-work of distinguished lichenologists (Acharius Medal). IAL award recipients are decided on by the Council. A call for nominations to all awards must be made in the Newsletter at least one year prior to the next general meeting. The initiation of further awards will be decided by the general meetings.

§11. Change of Constitutional Rules - Changes in these rules may be made only upon approval by not less than two-thirds of the Members present at the general meeting. Proposals of changes must be sent to Secretary at least four months prior to the general meeting, so that they will be disseminated to the Membership before the meeting. No rule change shall be allowed which will change the non-profit status of the IAL.

§12. Dissolution of the IAL - A motion to dissolve the IAL must be approved by at least two-thirds of the whole Membership. If the IAL is dissolved, any funds remaining after all outstanding liabilities are discharged shall be used for scientific purposes in the field of lichenology as agreed by the last Council.

Approved unanimously at IAL4 in Barcelona, 6 September 2000

Activities of the New Council (September - 7 December 2000)

In Barcelona, several newly elected members of the Council had a brief but intense meeting (while eating a sandwich in a bar). On that occasion, it was decided that henceforward the Council will work on-line. In other words, discussions and decisions will occur within an uninterrupted four-years-long Council meeting held on the Web. The new system, managed by the Secretary, was set up rapidly, and proved to work very well: decisions are generally made within a week. All the official correspondence is being printed and stored into an Archive, to be passed over to the next Council. At the moment (December 7th, 2000) we have 30 official messages (discussion) and 7 ballots (formal decisions). The main decisions are: 1) Thanks to a generous grant by the University of Graz, the Newsletter will continue to be paper-printed, 2) A new Conservation Committee of IAL was appointed, composed by Ch. Scheidegger (Chairman), C. Smith (Vice-Chairman), P. Wolseley (Secretary); participation is open to all IAL members who are interested. 3) The representatives of IAL within IUBS were elected; they are: P. L. Nimis and Ch. Scheidegger. The former took part to the IUBS assembly (Napoli, November); he was substituted in the following days by D. Hawksworth, who was present there as a former President of IUBS. 4) The Advisory Board (AB) of IAL was elected (see a complete list of Members elsewere in the Newsletter). The Council decided that the number of AB members should not exceed 30; further members are likely to be appointed in the future. AB Members were selected as follows: a) the contact persons of all local/national societies were requested to suggest the name of a person which could represent their Society in the AB, b) Nominations for additional members - to render the AB more representative in terms of geography and research fields - were proposed by the Council. Communication on-line with all AB members, managed by the President, was tested - see next point - and proved to work well. 4) Starting from 2001, IAL will endorse scientific events. More details are printed elsewhere in this issue of the Newsletter. This decision was taken after consulting the AB members: 15 of them contributed with very useful suggestions, which gives us hope that the collaboration between Council and Advisory Board will be fruitful and constructive. Finally, the President took part in the CODATA general meeting in Baveno in November. Contacts at the IUBS and CODATA meetings are likely to involve IAL more deeply in the activities of these large international organizations; these matters are presently under discussion by the Council; formal decisions will be published in the next issue of the Newsletter.

Pier Luigi Nimis

Upon a formal decision of Council, starting from 2001, IAL will endorse scientific events such as meetings, excursions, courses and exhibitions, organized by national/local societies, universities, museums, etc. Organizers of events endorsed by IAL will be entitled to advertise them as "held under the auspices of the International Association for Lichenology". This does not involve any direct funding by IAL, but - among other things - it might be useful to obtain local funding.

The events should comply with a few fundamental features: a) they should be non-profit, b) they should be scientifically relevant, c) possibly, they should have an international scope (not mandatory: local or national events could be endorsed by IAL as well), d) excursions or similar activities involving group collecting should comply with lichen conservation ethics.

Applications should be submitted, by e-mail, to the President of IAL (nimis@univ.trieste.it). They should not exceed two printed pages, and should be structured as follows:

1) name and complete address of the person in charge of the organization,
2) institution which is organizing the event (if any),
3) inscription fees (if any),
4) number of participants (when pertinent),
5) scope and target of the event,
6) duration of the event,
7) brief description of the scientific content of the event,
8) brief description of the administrative structure of the event,
9) further information (optional).

The Council will make a decision within a couple of weeks from the date of submission.

Pier Luigi Nimis

With this, my first report as Treasurer of the IAL, I first want to thank the exceptional work done by Edit Farkas as Treasurer of IAL for the last four years. Edit did an outstanding job in managing the European account and coordinating the financial activities of the American account. Edit was extremely generous with her time in ensuring that all minutiae inherent to this position, and to such a large membership, were dealt with efficiently and with compassion. In addition to her responsibilities as Treasurer, Edit also took-on the monumental task of sending the newsletter to all members. The IAL greatly benefited from Edit's devotion and commitment to this association. Thank you very much Edit!

What follows is a brief post-IAL4 financial report to give you an idea of our financial situation as of December 7, 2000. The Hungarian account balance is $6,456 US. This account will be transferred to Switzerland under the responsibility of Christoph Scheidegger, our new Assistant Treasurer for 2001-2004. The balance of the US account was $1,880.68 just before IAL4. The membership dues paid at IAL4 totaled $4,670.87, which was deposited in the US account, for a total of $6,551.55.

Following the initiative of our Past-President Martin Jahns, IAL accumulated $1,439.03 in donations at IAL4. Therefore, the grand total (with interest earnings) of all IAL accounts is $14,464.20.

If you have not done so already, it is now time to pay your IAL membership dues for the 2001-2004 period. The IAL council has adopted a new payment policy which consists of one payment of $40 for the 2001-2004 period. Please send your payment of $40 as soon as possible. Payments need to be in US dollars, and cheques or money orders must be payable to the "International Association for Lichenology". I have explored the possibility of making payments with credit cards as was requested at IAL4. Unfortunately, this is a rather expensive service for a single payment of $40 per member for four years. For this reason, this service will not be available. Please send your payment to either the Treasurer, François Lutzoni, or the Assistant Treasurer, Christoph Scheidegger, at the following addresses:

François Lutzoni, Treasurer

At the Fourth Congress of the International Association for Lichenology (IAL4) in Barcelona, 15 lichenologists generously donated $1,440 US to this association and 13 others have promised an additional $1,150 for a total of almost $2,600. The amount of single donations ranged from $10 to $500! As you know, the International Association for Lichenology (IAL) is a non-profit organization and has the power to raise funds by dues or other means as approved by the Council. The purpose of raising these funds is purely for scientific purposes such as funding awards, supporting congresses, distributing our newsletter (ILN), and partially covering travel expenses for students and other members who could not attend meetings otherwise.

All these activities are vital for our association to continue growing and attaining new heights in the scientific community worldwide. To encourage a broad and large membership, especially among students, the IAL annual dues are kept as low as possible ($10 US per year). One consequence of this decision is that revenues from these dues alone cannot meet this challenge to bring the IAL to higher standards of excellence which would result from new initiatives by IAL members. This is the reason for the establishment of an IAL Donation Fund by our Past-President Hans-Martin Jahns (1997-2000), and why your generous contributions, are so important to the future of IAL. This is the first time that a donation fund was established within IAL. It demonstrates that there is a renewed and strong collective will among past and current members of the IAL Council, as well as contributors like you, for IAL to play a proactive role in the lichenological and scientific communities. Together we are making a difference.

If you would like to make a donation to the IAL, please send a cheque or money order to François Lutzoni (Treasurer) or Christoph Scheidegger (Assistant Treasurer) payable to the "International Association for Lichenology". The donation must be in US$. Any amount in excess of the $40 membership fee will be considered as an official contribution to the IAL Donation Fund. Specific arrangements for money transfer can be made by contacting François or Christoph.

François Lutzoni, Pier Luigi Nimis