Welcome from the IFAC President




Ian Craig, President, IFAC

Dear IFAC Friends and Colleagues,

I take great pleasure in inviting you to attend the 19th IFAC World Congress in Cape Town, South Africa in August 2014. The World Congress is the flagship event of our Federation and has been held successfully every three years since the first congress in Moscow in 1960.

The success of the congress series and that of our federation can be attributed to the quality and dedication of the officers and officials who have served IFAC over many years, and to the unwavering support of the National Member Organizations of IFAC. Allow me to take this opportunity to thank all of you sincerely for the tremendous contributions that you have made to our federation, and to the automatic control community at large.

The Cape Town congress is historic for a number of reasons. It will be the first IFAC World Congress ever to be held in Africa, and it also promises to be by far the largest ever event in our field to be held in the southern hemisphere. The Council of IFAC awarded the 19th IFAC World Congress to South Africa in 2007, the culmination of a bidding process that started as far back as 1997. I am extremely grateful to our team who, under the leadership of Ed Boje, Fernando Camisani and Xiaohua Xia, has been hard at work ever since to offer you a highly rewarding, memorable and enjoyable congress.

The vision of IFAC is “for IFAC to be the worldwide federation for promoting automatic control for the benefit of humankind”, and we strive to fulfill this vision with our mission “to promote the science and technology of automatic control through technical meetings, publications and other means consistent with the goals and values of IFAC”.

The Cape Town Congress will give effect to the goals of IFAC in a number of ways:

  • We have organized a high-quality technical meeting that is relevant to the automatic control community. This is apparent from the large number of high-quality submissions that the Congress has received.
  • The publication material resulting from the Congress will be hosted on IFAC- PapersOnline, whereas a significant number of Congress papers will be adapted for publication in one of the six high-impact IFAC Journals, all trusted sources of material on automatic control known for their quality and technical excellence.
  • The Congress will help to create an environment within which the automatic control community can prosper. Toward this end we have arranged special 4 IFAC 2014 | handbook International Federation of Automatic Control panel sessions that will discuss:
    1. how better to connect academic research and industry practice; and
    2. how the control field can increase its impact and suitable funding opportunities.
    Furthermore, prospective employees (e.g. graduate students and post-doctoral fellows) and employers (from both academia and industry) can use the Congress to network.
  • The Congress provides volunteers with meaningful and rewarding opportunities for career-enhancing participation in the Federation through serving on the various committees that will meet before, during and after the Congress. These committees include technical and executive board committees, editorial boards of the IFAC journals, and teams that meet to organize future IFAC events.
  • The Congress will also help to promote the benefits of automatic control among the public at large. Initiatives in this regard include a public lecture that will demonstrate the astounding athletic power of quadcopters, and an outreach workshop aimed at exciting high-school learners to take up careers in the disciplines served by IFAC.

    The Cape Town Congress theme is in line with the vision of IFAC: “Promoting automatic control for the benefit of humankind”. Our community contributes to this vision in a number of ways. To highlight one highly relevant contribution: automatic control can and is playing a significant role in providing technologies that assist humankind to live lighter on the planet. It is significant in this regard that the technical area with the most contributions at the Cape Town Congress is power and energy systems.

    In conclusion, I would like to thank all for the contribution that you have and are making to the success of the 19th IFAC World Congress. I look forward to welcoming you to Cape Town, one of the most beautiful cities in the world.