Prof D Chandrasekharam

The 12th International Geological Conference was just concluded at Jeddah. Organised by the Saudi Geological Survey, the conference was held for 4 days, from 4th Feb till 7th Feb in the Jeddah Hilton. The Minister for Energy, Industry and Mineral Resources and other dignitaries from SGS, attended the opening ceremony. An exhibition was organised by SGS. International participation was low and the delegates mostly came from Egypt. The exhibition was very informative and showed the variety of economic mineral wealth of Saudi Arabia. Shield area is going to be the future for the country. Only abstract titles are available for the conference. This is one of the very few conferences that has not printed abstract volume and done away with the closing ceremony. The participants were ignorant of the content of the material presented at the conference. It was more as less a casual gathering. No seriousness was attached to the scientific content of the conference. The keynote speakers did their best and considerable information on the shield and surrounding regions was thrown open to the delegates. Many participants missed the keynote addresses due to confusion related to organization structure. The keynote speakers include Willam Bosworth (Shallow state of stress of the Arabian Plate and its boundaries: Synthesis and Uncertainties) , Reiner Haus (Minerals for renewable applications), Marco Pagani (A global collection of openly accessible hazard models: the GEM mosaic), D Chandrasekharam (Evolution of geothermal systems around the Red Sea: an Over view) and Karoly Nemeth (From geocities to geopark: volcanic geoheritage as a driving force for geoeducation and geotourism on volcanic regions). The conference rooms were miles apart and made the movement of the delegates difficult. In spite of organization flaws, the conference opened up huge opportunities for the country to be food secured and generate plenty of freshwater and reduce GHGs.