Federation News..............Informal Online IFATCA Meeting

On 17 November 2020, IFATCA held an online, informal meeting for its member associations using the Zoom platform.

The COVID-19 pandemic led our Federation’s Executive Board to cancel our annual conference that had been planned for March 2020. A number of member associations requested a special conference towards the end of the year. However, that also proved impossible for the same reason. Therefore, the Executive Board decided on a virtual meeting to update the member associations on some of the issues that the Federation faces. The event was moderated by IFATCA’s SESAR Coordinator, Marc Baumgartner.

IFATCA’s President and CEO Duncan Auld presented on the state of the Federation. Auld said IFATCA remains robust, even though there is no denying that the COVID-19 presents formidable challenges for air traffic control, air traffic controllers, and the professional associations worldwide. Although it is too early to tell what the exact consequences will be, the pandemic undoubtedly will have a lasting impact on the Federation. It is therefore essential that we prepare the Federation for these effects. Like many other organisations, the Federation itself was unprepared for a crisis that amongst many other things, prevents face-to-face meetings. This fact highlights the Federation’s need to make its decision-making process more dynamic. Such changes eventually will need to be reflected in the constitution and bylaws, but the Executive Board is working on an intermediate proposal to allow electronic voting in the absence of an annual conference where voting generally occurs.

Auld further elaborated on his intentions to make the Federation more responsive, to have a greater regional focus, and to develop a stronger technical and professional strategy. The latter should be more high level, with even stronger links to ICAO’s global plan, technical panels, and IFATCA’s own long term vision.

IFATCA’s President and CEO also highlighted a number of significant changes that were made to the financial management of the Federation. As part of this meeting, IFATCA’s EVP Finance Mark Taylor (supported by the Federation’s accountant and auditor) gave an overview of the 2018-2019 financial year. Taylor also discussed the outlook for the fiscal year that ended on 31 May, 2020, which is being audited in preparation of the annual conference in 2021. IFATCA’s Deputy President Helena Sjöström gave a presentation about her activities, including managing the 100 Year ATC and the Equality, Diversity, and Ethics task

Screen grab by Philip Marien (IFATCA)

z Photo: Participants of the online IFATCA meeting included (left to right, top to bottom) Duncan Auld (President and CEO), Mark Taylor (EVP Finance), Helena Sjöström (Deputy President), Ignacio Baca (EVP Technical), Peter Van Rooyen (EVP Professional), Marc Baumgartner (IFATCA SESAR Coordinator) and Jean-François Lepage (IFATCA Liaison Officer to the ICAO Air Navigation Commission).

forces. She also stated how she looks forward to the annual conference, planned in May 2021 in Jamaica. Given the uncertainty on how the global pandemic will evolve, the Executive Board committed to deciding by the end of January 2021 on whether the event could go ahead. Sjöström introduced the changes made to the conference organisation requirements. These are mainly aimed at making attendance of the annual conference more inclusive and affordable. Lastly, she gave a quick overview of the highlights of the IFATCA website, including the newly introduced wikifatca.org, which makes it easy to retrieve IFATCA technical and professional policies.

This was followed by presentations by EVP Professional Peter van Rooyen and EVP Technical Ignacio Baca. In recent months, professional work has focused on COVID-19 and producing material to help controllers cope with the challenges the crisis presents. This includes guidance on how to cope with issues personally and also broader advice on how to cope with the initial impact and the eventual recovery. On the technical side, work continues on a number of work items: guidance and provisional policy on drones and unmanned traffic management were developed, as was a refresher on volcanic ash and its impact on air traffic services.

IFATCA’s Liaison to the ICAO ANC JeanFrançois Lepage updated the members on the activities within ICAO, which unsurprisingly were also greatly affected by the COVID pandemic. He also urged member associations to submit their updates to the Information Handbook (IHB). The proposal for electronic voting was briefly introduced by IFATCA’s Communications Coordinator Philip Marien. From the initial discussion and feedback, it was clear that the proposal needs to be refined before it can be sent to member associations by mail for approval.

Some 54 member associations and nearly 120 individuals attended the meeting. There were some issues that the Executive Board will seek to improve for the attendees in future online meetings, which will likely be planned for the coming months. In the meantime, member associations can find video recordings of the different presentations on the IFATCA website. (Login is required.) y

Screen grab by Philip Marien (IFATCA)

z Photo:Participants of the IFATCA Committee D virtual quiz