RESOLUTION of the Council and of the Representatives of the Member States, meeting in the Council on the creation of a system of metallurgical documentation and information (SMDI) (adopted at the 157th session of the Council held on 24 June 1971)

THE COUNCIL AND THE REPRESENTATIVES OF THE MEMBER STATES, MEETING IN THE COUNCIL,

Having regard to the report drawn up by the "Scientific and Technical Research Policy" working party of the Medium Term Economic Policy Committee, pursuant to the Resolution adopted on 31 October 1967;

Having regard to the Resolution of the Council and of the Representatives of the Member States meeting in the Council, with a view to coordinating the action of Member States regarding scientific and technical information and documentation;

Whereas it is important to help make scientific and technical data in the metallurgical field available to all interested persons under the most favourable conditions as regards speed and expense;

Whereas to this end it is desirable, as a first experiment in the framework of coordination of national policies regarding STID and of the creation of a European net work in this field, to create a decentralized system of cooperation for metallurgical scientific and technical documentation and information;

Whereas, taking into account the powers which the ECSC and EAEC Treaties confer on the Communities in the field of metallurgy, it is appropriate that the Centre for Information and Documentation (CID) of the Commission should be linked to such a system, (a) recognize the value of creating a system of metallurgical documentation and information the principles and procedures for which are as listed in the Annex to this Resolution;

(b) approve the participation of the Commission in the proposed system in accordance with the procedures set out in the Annex and invite the Commission to submit any constructive proposals with a view to ensuring the participation of its services in such a system;

(c) consider that this Resolution must be seen as a first experiment in the framework of coordination of STID policies;

(d) recognize that the centres of Member States will have to make provision for associating the centres of other European States in such a system.

ANNEX PRINCIPLES AND PROCEDURES FOR THE SYSTEM OF METALLURGICAL DOCUMENTATION AND INFORMATION

1. LEGAL BASIS

The SMDI shall be established by a "provisional technical agreement" of limited duration (Doc R/195/71 (RECH 4)] concluded between all the national bodies referred to in paragraph 2 below and the Communities represented by the Commission. This agreement shall be concluded for a period of three years at the end of which a final agreement may be concluded regarding the continuation of the system.

2. STRUCTURE

The SMDI shall be established in the form of a system of decentralized cooperation linking: (a) the national STID centres or authorities, in view of their general responsibility for the promotion of STID at national level;

(b) a number of public or private centres specializing in metallurgy and called on to undertake certain functions, in regard either to input or output;

(c) the Commission which will, at least in the first stage of the implementation of the system, undertake the central processing and storage.

During this period, and to assist the establishment of optimum conditions for the development of such a system, contact shall be made with centres in such third countries in Europe as wish to participate in the system or are able to make a significant technical contribution to it.

3. COORDINATION

The coordination of the SMDI shall be carried out by a Coordination and Management Committee composed of two representatives from each country, one of whom will come from a body playing the role of correspondent in his respective Member State, together with one representative from the Commission.

4. FIELD COVERED

The SMDI shall process and disseminate all literature in the metallurgical field (ferrous, non-ferrous, techno-economic data etc).

5. ALLOCATION OF RESPONSIBILITIES - Literature originating in the Member States shall be supplied by the national or specialist centres appointed for this purpose;

- Literature originating in third countries shall be supplied by the same centres on the basis of a division of publications to be laid down in "provisional technical agreement", without prejudice to any agreements which may be reached with centres abroad ; this sharing out of responsibilities must be done in such a way as to ensure a fair division of the various types of publications, in particular of those which are of marginal interest or which present special language difficulties;

- "Output" shall in general be produced on a decentralized basis by the national and specialist centres;

Processing and storage shall be carried out by the Commission.

6. COMMENCEMENT OF ACTIVITIES

The system should be put into operation in 1971.