Because of the global character of contemporary science and engineering, it is essential for U.S. scientists and engineers, as well as their professional organizations, to remain in close touch with the activities and plans of their foreign counterparts, in part as a means to facilitate the development of collaborative programs. Additionally, gaining a better understanding of many important problems, such as those associated with the global environment, data quality and access, and the training and utilization of research personnel, require cooperative efforts on a multilateral basis. An increasing number of such problems either cut across, or transcend, indivudal scientific disciplines. The oldest and most extensive mechanism for facilitating world-wide communication between U.S. scientists and engineers and their foreign countarparts is the array of non-governmental international disciplinary unions and cross-disciplinary committees that together comprise the International Council of Science (ICSU), a non-governmental, multilateral organization comprised of adhering organization in over 90 countries. This award will permit the National Academy of Sciences to continue to manage U.S. participation in ICSU. It provides dues payments to ICSU and five of its 23 international disciplinary unions, and funds to support the activities of the committees of U.S. scientists and engineers who represent U.S. interests in ICSU and those unions.
