As most of you will be aware, the Minerals and Waste Faculty Board and the Environment Faculty Board have merged. Following this, the name for the new board has been debated both within the boards and via a poll to members of both faculties. The polls have now closed with approximately 2% of members voting on the new board name.

The newly merged board met on 24 September 2008 and the decision regarding the new name was derived from a number of factors. The board felt that the name should reflect the existing and emerging areas of practice of the membership, the skills sets of the board and that the name should also align with the RICS Policy Panels. The three policy panels of Environment, Minerals and Waste merged two years ago to form the Resources and Environment Policy Panel. This panel now falls under the remit of the new, merged board which will be called the Environment and Resources Board.  

I would stress that the Environment and the Minerals and Waste Faculties remain unchanged, members are still able to call themselves Chartered Mineral Surveyors and Chartered Environmental Surveyors, with the APC routes also remaining unchanged.

Concern has been expressed about environmental matters taking priority and the minerals and waste element being diluted. I would stress that it is intended to maintain a board make-up of 10 Environmental Chartered Surveyors and 10 Minerals/Waste Chartered Surveyors in order to retain a balance. In addition to this, we actively encourage feedback from the membership and welcome new ideas for projects.

Last year, both faculties responded to members by producing a record number of guidance and policy notes at the request of the membership.

For transparency purposes, an abridged version of the new merged board minutes will be published here on www.rics.org

Moving forward, as a new board we are at various stages in the delivery of a number of projects which include:

• An information paper produced by Peter Vincent entitled 'The Law Relating to Mineral Working & Mineral Landholdings'
• A comprehensive response to the Mine Waste Directive which is available for download
• A comprehensive response to the Soil Framework Directive
• There was a minerals special published earlier this year as part of the Land Journal
• We are about to engage with RICE Media Services in order to raise the profile of both faculties and promote the projects that we are working on
• We are currently scoping a new project to encourage new members into both faculties. Sadly there were only two-successful Minerals & Waste APC candidates last year, this situation is not sustainable
• We are currently scoping a new energy from waste project.

As a board we are conscious that we represent the membership and that delivering to the membership what the membership wants is of paramount importance. We therefore welcome your feedback and suggestions in order to provide this.

We currently have one place available on the merged board and would welcome CV’s from any chartered members who would like to put their name forward. The Executive Board will analyse candidates against a skills set analysis of current board members at the next Executive Board meeting. Our aim is to have as diverse a board as possible in terms of skills, professional background and geographical spread.

As a final point, we are currently organising the 2009 annual conference which is planned to take place next March in Sheffield. Any comments or suggestions that you may have regarding this will be gratefully received by the organising committee.

The board has spent a great deal of time recently on the issue of the new board name and I hope that you will now support us in moving forward. Our goal is to deliver the professional guidance, briefing papers and projects as requested by you, the membership.