`Barjol 'Confident' Council Back to Normal After Meeting Next Month - Olive Oil Times

Barjol 'Confident' Council Back to Normal After Meeting Next Month

By Julie Butler
Apr. 25, 2013 09:56 UTC

A finan­cial clamp on the activ­i­ties of olive oil’s peak body — the International Olive Council — could end at the end of May when a new attempt is made to pass its bud­get for 2013.

All other mat­ters that were on the agenda when its Council of Members lost quo­rum at what was meant to be the clos­ing sit­ting of its 100th ses­sion last November will also be back on the table for a new meet­ing late next month, IOC exec­u­tive direc­tor Jean-Louis Barjol has told Olive Oil Times.

Promotion in key mar­kets on hold

These include bud­gets to pro­mote olive oil in crit­i­cal growth mar­kets such as China, North America, Japan and Brazil — where the IOC’s pro­mo­tion work has prac­ti­cally frozen — and reports pre­pared by IOC com­mit­tees on issues such as pos­si­ble changes to the chem­i­cal para­me­ters for olive oil tests.

I am very happy that the IOC will be resum­ing activ­ity and that we’ll have the oppor­tu­nity not only to debate the 2013 bud­get and the activ­i­ties for 2013 which require expen­di­ture, but also that mem­bers will start their reflec­tion on the next gov­ern­ing agree­ment for the IOC, which is due to enter into force on January 1, 2015,” Barjol said.

Last Council ended abruptly, leav­ing IOC in limbo

The 100th ses­sion of the Council was due to vote on many rec­om­men­da­tions, includ­ing the IOC bud­get for 2013, at what should have been its clos­ing sit­ting last November 19 – 23 in Madrid. However, on the day vot­ing was due to occur, quo­rum was lost.

According to Olimerca mag­a­zine, mem­bers from Turkey and Israel walked out in dis­pute over a pro­posed new IOC staffing agree­ment.

The power to con­vene a Council meet­ing is held by the IOC pres­i­dent, a posi­tion cur­rently filled by for­mer IOC exec­u­tive direc­tor Habib Essid, Minister of the Interior in the interim gov­ern­ment of Tunisia.

Barjol expects next meet­ing will be effi­cient, and main­tain quo­rum

Barjol said that after a series of infor­mal con­tacts with some key IOC mem­bers, Essid had taken the deci­sion to call the meet­ing for the last week of May. He said he felt con­fi­dent the meet­ing would be an effi­cient one and would main­tain a quo­rum.

Barjol also stressed that the IOC had not come to a com­plete stand­still in the last five months. It is true that it has not been pos­si­ble to carry out activ­i­ties due to the lack of funds, but the Executive Secretariat has not been stand­ing by with its arms crossed.”

Work has con­tin­ued in many areas that do not require fund­ing, for exam­ple in the col­lec­tion and dis­sem­i­na­tion of sta­tis­tics, the pub­li­ca­tion of the mar­ket newslet­ter, the gath­er­ing of infor­ma­tion on pro­duc­tion costs, the Mario Solinas Award, the pre­lim­i­nary steps for the IOC’s par­tic­i­pa­tion as the project super­vi­sor of a pilot nurs­ery, and the devel­op­ment and approval of a col­lab­o­ra­tion agree­ment with the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO),” he said.



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