IPSEC IV - Informal Meeting of Representatives of Physical Societies
Gdańsk, 15 September 2003

Introductions
Maciek Kolwas welcomed everyone to Gdańsk - birthplace of many famous people including Fahrenheit and Nobel Prize winners Günter Graß and Lech Wałęsa. Jaroslav Nadrchal then took the chair. The main topics for discussion were to be the World Year of Physics and the EU Framework programmes.

Taiwan Yang Shin Nan gave details of the Physical Society of the Republic of China, for which is chair of the Committee on International Affairs. It was founded in 1958 and has 1200 members, of whom 530 have PhDs (mainly from the US). It has two publications Chinese Journal of Physics (in English), Physics (in Chinese). There are collaboration agreements with the American, Czech, Latvian, Lithuanian, Polish and Slovak physical societies and with the Australian Institute of Physics. There is an exchange of scientists between Taiwan and the Czech Republic.

World Year of Physics
In Taiwan the programme of activities is in three sections:
1. Summit of physics - involving distinguished physicists, policy makers, funding bodies, etc. Proceedings will be published.
2. Expo for physics - demonstrations of physics, public lectures, etc.
3. Physics competitions - Olympiad, 100 years of Einstein, etc.
In Poland the emphasis is on persuading young people that physics is neither difficult nor boring. It is important to tell young people what physics is - not how important it is. The emphasis is on changing opinions. The 2005 meeting of Polish physicists will lectures for schools, open days, competitions, courses for physics teachers, etc. under the theme physics enlightens the world. Sponsors are needed.
In Germany 2000 was the national year of physics. This demonstrated that bringing physics to the attention of the public works. Industry demand for physicists is now good, although not as good as a few years ago. They will not be repeating it in 2005. However, there will be a central event in Berlin on 4-9 March 2005 on highlights of physics, bringing together the DPG annual meetings. There will be a lot of international participation and a lot of public events.
David Lee stressed the importance of the banner World Year of Physics, with everything happening at the same time under the same banner.

Project for increased co-operation between physicists
Natalia Maloushina stressed the need to raise the level of co-operation between physicists in the CIS and the rest of Europe; particularly as they don't know how to work with the EU. With the assistance of an Italian company she was drawing up a proposal for Framework 6 funding for a collaboration network under EPS and requested support for this venture.

EU Framework programmes
Christian Patermann made it clear that Framework funding was not for something missing at a national level. He stressed the importance of Europe as a European Research Area (ERA), embracing more than the EU itself. There are four main aspects: 1) research and innovation, 2) human resources and mobility, 3) research infrastructure, 4) science and society. 15% of funding is for strengthening the ERA and 2% for strengthening ERA foundations. Physics is everywhere in FP6, but nothing is labelled by discipline. We need to get away from a monolithic view of physics. Projects need to be approached on an interdisciplinary basis, e.g. art conservation. Biology and chemistry together are winning as is engineering. However, 70% of the research infrastructure funding goes to physics.
Switzerland, Norway, Iceland and Israel are associated countries and pay on the same bases as EU states and are treated on an equal footing. Candidate countries, Eastern Europe and the CIS are also parts of the ERA. Mobility is very important and funding for mobility extends beyond the EU and includes funding to get people back to their country of origin when needed. The aim is to make the EU attractive to the world. FP6 is open to the world. FP5 was open to candidate countries and played an important role in EU enlargement. More than 7% of the money goes to candidate countries including Bulgaria, Romania, Turkey, etc. In the future Russia and Mediterranean countries will be included.
The aim is to increase research funding in the EU to 3% of GDP (as in USA) from the current average of 1.9% dropping to 1.5% with the accession of the current candidate countries. There was a mistake by the EU and the candidate countries in that the lower limit for research funding was not included in the negotiations over accession. The problem of funding for basic research is being discussed now within the EU Research Commission. David Lee stressed the need to concentrate now on FP7, where he would like priorities to include infrastructure and ensuring that there was not a drop in basic research in candidate countries. Christian Patermann said that infrastructure included more than just railways, but as such steps were not taken for Ireland, Portugal or Greece this would be difficult.
In summary physics plays an indispensable but limited role, we should look at interdisciplinarity, use mobility, look internationally, and don.t tell people how important physics is but how physics is changing our lives. The science and society programme includes changing gender base, but is not to be used for money that should have been provided from national programmes.
Colin Carlile stated that CERN, ESA, ESO, JET, ILL, etc. received very little EU funding and were largely funded nationally. What is missing is a European power in deciding strategy. The three big countries make decisions and the small countries have little input. The EU could be helpful in driving strategy. Christian Patermann indicated that the European Commission would welcome such a proposal.
Yang Shin Nan said that a science centre was being set up in Taiwan. Advertising for physicists from the USA was easy as advertisements could be put in Physics Today. He was advised that in Europe he should advertise in Europhysics News, Physik Journal and Physics World; that way he would reach members of all physical societies.

Peter Melville

Participants of the IPSEC - IV