A Working Group Meeting on Extending the RCA Medium Term Strategy was held 27-31 July 2009 at the IAEA Headquarters, Vienna, Austria in order to review the current RCA Medium Term Strategy, to identify its strengths and weaknesses, and to develop a Medium Term Strategy for a period of three TC cycles commencing from 2012.

The RCA Member States adopted a Medium Term Strategy for RCA at the 28th Regional Meeting of the National RCA Representatives held in March 2006, which set out a revised Vision, Mission and a set of strategic directions for the RCA over the period 2006-2011. Since the priorities for the RCA programme for 2012-2013 has to be decided at the 32nd RCA NRM to be held in 2010, the RCA Member States at the 31st NRM held in 2009, decided to appoint a Working Group comprising representatives of Australia, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, and New Zealand, and Pakistan, to extend the RCA Medium Term Strategy beyond the current period of 2006-2011. China which had not been represented at the NRM was also invited. From the IAEA, Mr. D. Yang, Director, Mr P. Dias, RCA FP, Division for Asia and the Pacific, and from the RCARO, Mr. Mun-Ki Lee, Dir-RCARO and his staff member, Jay H. Lee also attend the Meeting as observers.

The working group analyzed all issues referred to it and has produced a revised MTS and supporting documents addressing other issues that it discussed. The WG meeting was conducted in a spirit of cooperation and with good involvement from all participants. The attachments to the produced report contain the MTS, Implementation Plan, revised survey form and information for the follow up working group on the regional strategic priorities document. The results of the WGM will be reported to the National Representatives for their discussion and endorsement.

For more information contact Mr P. Dias, RCA Focal Person at m.p.dias@iaea.org.