1. OPENING REMARKS
In his opening remarks, Mr. Mohammad Roozitalab, GFAR Chair, welcomed all participants,
with a special recognition of those attending the meeting for the first time, such as new
Regional Fora (RF) chairs from APAARI (Mr. H.P.M. Gunasena), FARA (Ms. Njabulo
Nduli) and other stakeholder representatives Mr. Ron Bonnett from IFAP and Mr. Robert
Carreau from the European Commission (see the full list participants in Annex 2). He
reminded participants of the decision to convert the NARS sub-Committee to a Program
Committee (PC) with new programmatic functions, and that this was the first time the
committee was meeting as a PC, to which reports of past achievements and future plans and
programs of all stakeholder groups will henceforth be presented, so that it can carry out its
new programmatic function. Hence the presence of all stakeholder groups including the
previous Advanced Research Institutions (ARIs) which as in the revised Charter are now
considered as RF from Europe and North America, as well as coordinators of on-going Global
Partnership Programs (GPPs), who will all make brief presentations.