President’s Report

President’s report

Dr K Y Cheung retired as President at the end of 2003, after completing 3 years as inaugural President of AFOMP. During Dr Cheung’s watch, AFOMP consolidated and grew, the constitution was developed and Mongolia and Nepal joined to bring the membership to 16 States. Three successful AOCMP meetings were held, the first in Bangkok, the second meeting with the Korea-Japan Society in Gyeongju and the third with wc2003 in Sydney. The status of Medical Physics in the region was surveyed and results are pending.

Summary of activities

This year has seen an ongoing effort to develop AFOMP’s role in the Asia-Pacific region. However, it is clear that for AFOMP to be of real significance in the region, we must generate funds, primarily from commercial support. Dr Ng has noted problems with attendance at the Kuala Lumpur meeting, because of a lack of travel grants.

New Members

Iran expressed interest in applying for membership.
The President visited the non-member states Brunei and Vietnam to begin a relationship with these countries, with limited support from IOMP and AFOMP. Unfortunately, there were insufficient funds to visit other countries in the region.

Annual Meetings and Scientific Programs

Dr Kwan Ng has done a great job in putting together the 4th AOCMP/3th SEACOMP in Kuala Lumpur, and Japan has volunteered to hold the 2005 meeting in Kyoto.

AFOMP Journal

Our relationship with the journal APESM continues to grow. APESM published the 4th AOCMP abstracts (Vol 27/2,75-106), and continues to feature the Office Bearers of AFOMP on a separate page.
However, we need to encourage AFOMP members to publish in this journal.

Future Directions

We must develop independent funding sources, in much the same way as IOMP. The regional meetings should contribute to our funds, but more importantly, commercial interests, which will be the beneficiaries of the developing markets in the AFOMP region, should provide the oil to grease the AFOMP wheels. To this end, a Commercial Funds Committee was formed with this objective. Members are KY Cheung, K Inamura and the Chair is BJ Allen. Further, the Professional Development Committee (PDC) needs to establish guidelines for the development of standards in Developing Countries. In this way, AFOMP can make meaningful contributions to our region. The Regional Cooperative Agreement is now back on course, and a draft policy has been submitted to the IAEA by the administering officer in Australia. The RCA will be critical in bringing training opportunities to the AFOMP region.

Barry J Allen
President, AFOMP

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