On 19 May, the third meeting of the JINR Science and Technology Council (STC JINR) of this year took place. The key topic of the Council’s meeting, held with the participation of its new members, was the discussion of the Institute’s plans in the fields of improving the status of an international organization and personnel policy. At the end of the meeting, participants of the event elected Deputy Chairman of the Council, outlined the main work directions of a new membership.

JINR Director RAS Academician Grigory Trubnikov opened the meeting. He welcomed former Chairman of STC JINR Professor Rostislav Jolos and expressed gratitude to him for his effective work during many years in this post. New Chairman of STC JINR became Doctor of Physics and Mathematics Elena Kolganova, a leading researcher, Head of the Human Resources and Records Management Department (HRRMD). Norbert Kučerka, Deputy FLNP Director, was elected Deputy Chairman of STC JINR.

In his speech, Grigory Trubnikov defined two most important tasks of the Institute in the coming months. They are to improve the status of JINR as an international organization by ensuring effective work with the JINR Member States and to attract young scientists from other countries to Dubna.

As for the first task, the Director highlighted that the Institute was in good shape. “None of the most important indicators of the institute has gone down and had negative tendency over the past six months. The JINR Member States pay their contributions according to the schedule. The contributions to the budget give us resources and funds to fulfil all our plans,” Grigory Trubnikov said.

A meeting of the Working group under the Committee of Plenipotentiaries Chairman on financial issues of JINR is scheduled for 10 – 11 July. It is expected that delegations from seven countries will take part in the event. It means that all members of the Working group will be there. “The meeting will be held in Irkutsk. Therefore, members of the delegations will be able to visit one of our basic facilities – the Baikal-GVD Neutrino Telescope,” Grigory Trubnikov announced the plans. “The main issue for the Working group is the budget for the next seven years. As a result of the meeting, members of the Working group will make recommendations to the JINR Finance Committee and the Committee of Plenipotentiaries of the Governments of the JINR Member States.” Among other things, they will deal with issues of the amounts of contributions of the JINR Member States and the methods of their calculations.

As the JINR Director highlighted, the Institute is actively engaged in the development of international cooperation. It is planned to hold numerous conferences in different countries and to organize the first official visit of a JINR delegation to Mexico. In cooperation with China, specialists are preparing the first meeting of the JINR-China Joint Coordination Committee, at which its participants will discuss the development of the cooperation between the countries.

“We feel daily support of our Member States. It is the most important thing,” Grigory Trubnikov concluded. “At the same time, it is very important to improve international cooperation by increasing the number of JINR employees from these countries.” Grigory Trubnikov emphasised that it is necessary to come up with tools to solve this problem. At this point, the involvement of the directors of the laboratories and the leaders of JINR projects plays an important role here.

At the end of the meeting, members of the Council defined the main future directions of their work. It is planned to discuss a strategy and necessary steps to implement the basic projects of the Institute on time, operation strategies for the JINR University Centre, the JINR Dissertation Councils, the Association of Young Scientists and Specialists. In addition, members of the Council made a decision to organize a special Committee under STC JINR aimed at opening up more possibilities of providing feedback between the laboratories, between employees of the scientific and technical sector and administrative departments, and considering issues raised at meetings of STC JINR.