Annual General Meeting 2010

It is a pleasure to announce that following the approval of the Geologists Act in July 2008, the Geologists Regulation was finally approved by the Attorney General in March 2010. Currently, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (NRE) and the Minerals and Geoscience Department (JMG) is in the midst of preparing a draft of the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) with the cooperation of the Institute. With the approval of the Regulations, the enactment of the Act will take place as soon as the Protem members of the Board of Geologists are appointed. There are still many hurdles to overcome, but I ask for your patience and your faith in the Institute and the Board of Geologists.

For the benefit of the geological community, a Technical Talk entitled `The Geologists Act’ is organized prior to the Annual General Meeting 2010.  The talk is hope to answer all questions pertaining to the Act and resolve some issues with regards to the regulations.

I am happy to note that membership to IGM has surged in recent months. In fact, the Council had had an overwhelming tasks of processing and approving all the applications. We have a total of 220 members as at today, of which 148 are Full Members, 4 Fellow, 2 Licenciate, and 17 Graduate Members.

This is an indication that our effort to make IGM relevant has paid off. In line with this, the Council has deliberated the award of Fellowships to its members and came out with a set of guidelines for application by eligible members. This Fellowship shall be headed by the Vice President.

IGM is expected to play a new role and an active role in the implementation of the Act, particularly in the area of expertise development and training. In line with this, the institute shall be organizing training courses in line with the professional approach towards the Continuous Professional Development (CPD) accepted by the Board of Geologists (BoG). The Institute by the way is planning to have some courses on terrain mapping and groundwater soon. IGM is further working on structured training courses to meet the needs of the industry and where possible in collaboration with local institutes of higher learning.

During the year, as proposed and agreed during the last AGM, the institute has been using the services of a third party company, Centre for Societies (CFS), to handle all its administrative work. This involves especially the processing of new membership applications. This arrangement was deemed necessary as the workload was too voluminous for the institute to handle alone. We admit there are still some stream-lining to be done, but we hope to continue working with them to ensure a smooth-running system of the institute.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank my Council for the effort they put in during my tenure as President for the past four sessions. Some members of the Council, including myself have to leave not because we did not want to continue serving the Council but because our Constitution requires us to relinquish the posts after six consecutive years. I would also like to thank the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (NRE) for their tireless support and guidance throughout our mission, and a big thank you to the Geological Society of Malaysia (GSM) for their collaboration.

I also wish to take this opportunity to thank Anna, who has served IGM faithfully all these years. Last by not least, I would like to thank you, the members, for standing solidly behind me and waiting patiently while I fight for our course.  

Dato’ Yunus Abdul Razak
President
4 th May 2010