Introduction

The Work Programme of SC4 Sub-Committee IHB, was defined by the recommendation of the 1991 Conference: “Updating of the IHB“.

At the 1988 Annual Conference, the following recommendations were adopted:

88.C.1: “SC4 Sub-Committee IHB shall update the IHB by means of a questionnaire, which will be distributed to the RVP’s every two years, starting in 1988, and this not later than July 1st, with the request that RVP’s return the answers to Sub-Committee IHB as soon as possible after their Regional Meeting or before December 1st, in case no Regional Meeting is held”

88.C.3: “The E.B. tasks the RVP’s with the distribution and collection of the IHB questionnaire within their Region”.

88.C.4: “The updating of the IHB should remain an agenda item at each Regional Meeting”.

Discussion

Following a very poor reply before last year’s Conference, to the IHB questionnaire distributed in 1989 in accordance with recommendation 88.C.1, the activities of the Sub-Committee were confined to collecting the missing updates. Contacts were maintained with the IFATCA VicePresident Europe and with the Vice-President Professional.

At the end of 1991, Sub-Committee was able to collect 51 out of 73 questionnaires from the following Member Associations listed per Region:

AFI: Djibouti, Egypt, Ghana, Kenya, Namibia, Tanzania, Uganda.

AMA: Aruba, Canada, Cenamer, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Netherlands Antilles, Nicaragua, Panama, St. Lucia.

ASP: Australia, Fiji, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, New Zealand, ROCATCA Taiwan, Sri Lanka.

EUR: Austria, Belgium, Channel Islands, Cyprus, Denmark, Eurocontrol, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Israel, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom (CAA), United Kingdom (non-CAA), USSR, Yugoslavia.

The following Member Associations, again listed by Region, have NOT YET replied to the 1989 edition of the IHB Questionnaire:

AFM: Algeria (new member since 1991), Burkina Faso, Mauritius, Morocco, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, Sudan, Tunisia, Zimbabwe.

AMA: Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador, Guyana, Honduras, Mexico, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay.

ASP: –

EUR: Poland

Conclusions

Up to now SC4, Sub-Committee IHB has been able to collect nearly 70% of the replies. The number of updates received, expressed in percentage, for each of the IFATCA Regions is the following:

AFI: 41% (7 out of 17)

AMA: 48% (10 out of 21)

ASP: 100% (8 out of 8)

EUR: 96% (26 out of 27)

Following the trend of the last couple of years, the reply to the IHB questionnaire was again very disappointing in some Regions. In addition, the majority of replying Member Associations did not meet the target date of Recommendation 88.C.1. IFATCA has previously resolved that the IHB is an important part of the Federation’s documentation. Its existence should therefore not be an item of discussion. As we believe that the IHB should be complete to be effective, SC4 likes to identify the problem or problems causing 30% of the Member Associations not to reply to the IHB questionnaire.

Therefore, SC4 would like to invite the Executive Vice-Presidents of the Regions to address Committee C in Bournemouth on the problems encountered within their respective Regions with regard to the collection of the updates and/or meeting the target dates mentioned in Recommendation 88.C.1, when replying.

The automated updating of the IHB has been finalised. The programme used as basis is an IBM compatible combination of database/word processor called “Q & A”.

The advantage of such a combined programme is that it allows information to be selected and/or sorted according to several criteria and to be printed in different presentations and/or formats. Although this automation of the IHB enables Sub-Committee IHB to update the information on a short time basis, the lack of replies prevents Sub-Committee IHB to make full use of this advantage.

With regard to next year’s update, SC4 Sub-Committee IHB likes to point out again to the MA’s, which have replied to the 1989 issue of the questionnaire, that, in case of no change or a minor change to the information contained actually in the Manual, they are not required to complete the whole questionnaire again. A small note indicating that the information is still valid, or a few lines pointing out eventual changes are quite sufficient.

Recommendations

The Executive Vice Presidents of the Regions will inform Sub-Committee IHB on their problems with regard to the collection of the IHB questionnaire and/or meeting the target dates of Recommendation 88.C.1.

At each Regional Meeting the Agenda Item “Updating of the IHB” should include the collection of the IHB updates.