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Indian dancers at the IIW Annual Assembly, Chennai 2011
LINKING PEOPLE, JOINING NATIONS
2000, was a watershed in the evolution of these relationships with emerging countries, not
just in SE Asia, but in other regions around the world. It was to serve as a model and to
define what the real purpose of regional development was all about. That was to identify the
needs of the countries in the region and produce IIW supported programmes to help meet
those needs, particularly through the efforts of the host country and others in the region.
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The President of the Singapore Welding Society, Mr Ang Chee Pheng,
was to emphasise this relationship in his keynote address at the Melbourne
congress, and the general feeling at the end was that the objectives of the
congress had been achieved, especially in relation to developing nations.
The overall effect of the congress was to prove positive in encouraging
membership of IIW with Pakistan joining in 2000, Thailand in 2001 and
Singapore in 2002, with Indonesia and Malaysia joining in 2003 and 2004
respectively. It was also a further catalyst for India to re-join the ranks of IIW
in 2004 as a forerunner to a highly successful IIW International Congress
held in Mumbai in 2005.
A chance meeting in Copenhagen during the IIWAnnualAssembly in 2002 ultimately
was to lead to the development of a network for welding technology diffusion throughout
the emerging countries in the south-east Europe region.
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The discussions between Prof.
Dr-Ing. Dorin Dehelean (Romania), Mr Adrian Campurean (Secretary of State for Research
and Parliament Relations, Romania) and Smallbone resulted in the presentation of a
workshop by Smallbone to promote the ideals and concepts of technology diffusion at the
same time as the 56th Annual Assembly hosted by Romania in July 2003. The workshop
was an outstanding success and was followed up by further workshops, also facilitated