RSC has a very long history and tradition, what have been the major adaptations it has gone through during the last 10 years?

Over the last ten years, we have been growing at a considerable rate. It started off from growth in our publishing area, so the volume of work that we publish and the revenues that we attract from that, have grown a lot, enabling us to raise our activity. That has also increased the number of staff greatly; we are now up to about 600 staff, which makes us quite a big organisation to manage, which poses its own challenges.

What recommendations would you make to other younger European societies?

I think that the important thing is, to stress the importance of national chemical societies and what they achieve for their members within the remit of their resources. I think national chemical societies are incredibly important for individual chemical communities and they should be supported and helped with volunteers and all other possible support.

What are the key factors to construct a reputation of trustworthiness and accessibility for a chemical society, reputation being one of the strengths of the RSC?

I think that independence is very important, that is, indepedence of any particular government or industry or anything else. Integrity is also always very important. As scientists, we always have to put evidence first, so as long as we are talking about evidence-based things we will be fine. Then, if we try and influence people with policies or anything else like that, it is our role to produce good high quality evidence that will then be influential.

How and why has RSC evolved in campaigning?

Campaigning is very important for developing that influence. At the moment we have three major campaigns. One is for funding science in which the UK is behind some other communities in Europe in terms of funding as a proportion of the GDP. Another is about having specialist chemistry teachers in schools, which is a particular problem in some parts of the UK and the other is about public perception of chemistry, chemists and chemicals. We produce these campaigns because we want to try to make a difference and try influence some things, like policy or funding or just public perceptions. It is important to work at using the influence that you have.

The UK is very important in Chemistry in terms of both research as well as industry. How does RSC play its leadership in Europe?

We have to recognize that within Europe, the UK is only one voice amongst many and on the European basis we have to speak with one voice. It is very important to have joined-up views and recommendations as well as a good solid reputation. On a political basis, one chemicals society within Europe probably will not have any influence on the European Parliament but a strong community of European chemicals societies working together as one voice has the opportunity to produce influence within the European Parliament and that I think, is something that we have to work at.

What has the strategic partnership policy that you have developed brought to RSC?

It has brought to us the ability to do bigger programmes overseas from the UK than we would have otherwise been able to do purely with only our own resources. One of the programmes is our Pan-African chemistry networking in Subsaharian Africa, where we are trying to build analytical chemistry strength within various hubs in Africa. We also have a programme to train about 8,000 chemistry teachers in India to be trainers of other teachers. We would not have been able to do these things without strategic partnerships with other organisations, usually industry. One thing that we will not do, is have industry dictating what it is we should do in those places. So, again, it is keeping that independence and saying we think there is a need to do something, either educational or capacity- building, and we are quite happy to accept funds from companies to do that, but we will not be representing individual interests in those places, for example.

Is that the reason why you have international presence?

We have international presence because the RSC has had members in many places around the world, particularly in commonwealth countries, for many years. But it is not only in commonwealth countries, we also have some big groups of ex-patriots in places like the US and, for example, in Belgium, there are a lot of ex-patriot British citizens who work in Brussels, so we have a reasonably-sized section of members there. However, our strategy with the international sections is to work in countries with their national chemical societies, where chemistry is really growing around the world, to ensure that UK chemistry is completely linked to the chemistry that is going on in those places where chemistry is growing very fast.

How do you see the future of RSC?

At the moment we are doing a project where we are trying to look forward 20 years or so, not to try and guess what the chemistry environment is going to be like then, but to try and get some of the best minds in the UK, academia and industry, to give their views to us, as to where they think chemistry is going. That way, we can have a view to how we can transform the RSC within that time period to be ready to the challenges that are facing us ahead, so that we can change the society and its outputs and resources to fit what chemistry and the chemical community need from us.

And that of other European Chemical societies?

I hope that they will grow with their communities because what is good for European chemistry as a whole, is to have strong national chemical societies running really good supportive programmes within their countries nationally. I think that is what everybody wants and it is what we should all be aiming for.

How do we (Europeans) benchmark with other world regional societies such as the American?

It is interesting because, purely in terms of numbers, the American Chemical Society is bigger than any other. They obviously have a lot of members outside of the US as well, but I am not sure their influence and reach is quite the same around the world as some of the other chemical societies. They obviously have a lot in terms of resources as well from their BIT Publishing programmes. But there are other very good publishers out there in the chemistry arena, certainly, the GDCH and Chemiconsult journals which are extremely good, also the RSC journals are very good, and some of the commercial journals are good as well. It is actually a difficult one to benchmark. I think you would have to look at specific activities and you can benchmark activities in different areas. I would say, if it were influencing in relationships with China and India and places in Africa, then the RSC has a bigger reach and influence than the ACS.

Does Europe maintain its leading role in terms of Chemical research and innovation?

Yes, I think it does. I think we have the benefit of, historically and currently, a very intelligent and committed scientific workforce, a massive chemical industry within Europe as well as a very good eco-system for developing science. We also have fantastic universities across Europe, a lot to build on and a lot to be proud of.

How do EuCheMS congresses help bring the Chemical community together?

I think it helps a lot. Some of the congresses have been more successful than others. It is absolutely our responsibility to try and make the congress as good as it can be. We really need to showcase how good chemistry in Europe is and the European Chemical congresses is the way in which we should be doing that, amongst others. It is also very important in bringing our young people together as well. I think that the European Young Chemists’ network has a big role in that as well and it also does some very good work in bringing out young chemists in the community together.

How have they evolved?

It is difficult when they are only every other year. I think that it is one of the issues that we have with congresses. If we had one every year then there would be more of a sense of momentum and if we had one that was slightly less good, it would have less impact on the series as a whole. But that is, maybe, something for the future, We have an excellent congress in Seville and we will therefore have a lot more to build upon.

What in your view can be the differential factor this time for the 6th EuCheMS congress?

I think we see, readily, that we have fantastic local organisation. The level of preparedness is exemplary at the moment and I think, and I have great confidence, that this is going to be a really successful meeting scientifically and organisationally. Also, Seville is a fantastic venue, as it has the attraction of being a positive draw, being a place where people will want to go. It is also reasonably central enough in Europe so that it will attract a good representation from all the communities within Europe, I hope. I think that there is almost nothing that could be better at the moment.

How would you describe the Spanish scientific community?

I think the words I would probably use, are words like “vibrant, collaborative” and “connected”. I think Spain also has a great chemical industry. It also has some fantastically historic universities and it has some really excellent researchers.

17. Why should someone who has never participated attend the 6th EuCheMS congress?

I think they should come because they should support the European Chemistry congress and support it by showing their best work in a European context and because I think it will be a fantastic congress in Seville and will also be the place where everyone wants to be.