• Rome Conference (20 Sep 2004)
• WFSA Annual Meetings 2004
• World Forum/UN Activities (8 May 2002)
• UN Conference Report

World Conference Success in Rome
Experts discuss future of ammunition

The first ever World Symposium on Lead in Ammunition, held in Rome, Italy on 9-10 September 2004, was organized and hosted by the World Forum on the Future of Sport Shooting Activities. More than 140 representatives from twenty countries attended. The primary purpose was to exchange the latest information regarding the use of lead in ammunition.

The major conclusion of the conference was while lead in ammunition can pose risks in certain environments, these risks can be managed using simple and practical techniques. It was also recognized that the search for effective alternatives must continue.

The conference brought together the leading scientists and professionals, along with government officials and industry and shooting organization representatives from around the world. Their diverse backgrounds and perspectives made for lively debate and positive exchange of information.

Thirty-two presentations were made during the symposium. Scientific studies of lead mobility and corrosion as well as lead-risk and consumer-exposure assessments were reviewed. Technical reports on requirements of ammunition performance, alternative materials currently available, environmental impacts of new materials, hazards to wildlife, methods to manage risks posed by lead ammunition and new concepts in shooting range design were all presented.

Status reports were shared on legal, legislative, policy and regulation efforts, in addition to examples of shooting sports community and agency education and outreach initiatives. While lead was of principal concern, other metals and constituents found in ammunition or used as proposed alternatives to lead were discussed. The closing session provided an opportunity for open discussion and proposed a vision for the future. 

The World Forum on the Future of Sport Shooting Activities believes this conference will serve as the major reference point for legislators and shooting organizations to work together in a co-operative manner.

For more information please contact:
Secretariat HQ: 0039.06.5903510
Mauro Silvis: 0039.335.7842150

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SAGA delegate Bruce Shaw, attended the meetings. As an executive member of WFSA, SAGA is able to participate in all the meetings of this well-established world body. 

The keynote speech was given by Mr Eugène Lapointe, President, World Conservation Trust
The New Imperialism: How NGO’s threaten sustained and reasonable use of our natural resources

The Sport Shooting Ambassador Award 2004 was presented to Mr RL Wilson, an American author

A Call to Action was delivered at the Plenary Session by Bruce Shaw of SAGA (Link to Speech)

For more information on WFSA visit their website at www.wfsa.net

See also WFSA Articles

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NGO Status Recommendation
SAGA is an active member of the WFSA - the World Forum on the Future of Sport Shooting Activities - and although we are unable to attend every conference and meeting, our involvement is important as we are kept informed about firearm matters world wide. 

This report is from Keith Tidswell:
Good News from New York
This morning Friday the 25th January 2002 in New York the World Forum on the Future of Sport Shooting Activities was heard by the NGO Committee and has been recommended for NGO Roster Status. ECOSOC will meet in May 2002 to formally consider the NGO Committee’s recommendations. We will then receive further communication notifying us of the outcome and pointing out our obligations and responsibilities as an NGO and the manner in which we can indicate this status on our letter-head. The wording will be “NGO on the Roster in consultative status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations”. We cannot use this until we are officially notified.

19 Countries sat on the committee; Algeria, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Ethiopia, France, Germany, India, Lebanon, Pakistan, Rumania, Russian Federation, Senegal, Sudan, Tunisia, Turkey and USA. A number of other countries were also in attendance as observers. France spoke first followed by USA, Turkey, Senegal, the Russian Federation, Pakistan, Algeria, Sudan, India, China, and Tunisia. All of these countries spoke in complementary and supportive terms. There was no country that dissented. 

The USA indicated that we had their full support and highlighted the work we were doing in environmental areas as well as the work with CICP in Vienna and the Small Arms and Light Weapons Conference. India made the point that they had always strongly supported us and highlighted our scientific contributions in the area of marking, recovery and tracing of firearms.
Algeria, by asking questions gave us the opportunity to remind delegates of our past work and further elaborate on how the WFSA would continue to contribute to the work of the UN. It also allowed us touch on our proposed “Firearms as Baggage on Airlines Workshop”. Algeria made the point as did several other countries that the WFSA was an organization that was carrying out very serious work that should be held up as an example to others.
Colombia indicated their support privately rather than repeat what everybody else was saying when it was obvious from the tone of the meeting that there was strong support.
The Chairman Mr. Bilman from Turkey thanked us for our patience and apologized for the delays.

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UN Conference on the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in all its Aspects
9 - 20 July 2001 : New York

SAGA was accredited as a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) for this United Nations (UN) conference in New York and it was decided that two delegates would attend: Bruce Shaw and Alex Holmes. The following report is from Bruce Shaw.

On arrival on the Friday morning, 7am NY local time, we made contact with Tom Mason, Executive Secretary to the World Forum on the Future of Sport Shooting Activities (WFSA), the chief co-ordinator of all the pro-firearm groups. We arranged a meeting to give us a brief run down on the current situation and organised to attend the WFSA "Briefing for Firearms Community Groups Appearing at the UN Conference", on the Sunday.
On the Saturday, there was an informal gathering to work on our speeches and I met many interesting people including Carlo Peroni (Head of Beretta), Robert Glock, Richard Alexander (NRA Manager of External Affairs), Congressman RL (Bob) Barr (USA) and Guy Wilson (Master of the Royal Armouries, UK). Topics covered included an update on the conference, general themes and strategy, list of speakers, review of individual presentations, and plans for future meetings. It was also announced at this meeting that the UN had decided that NGOs would not receive any finance in future. See: Main Firearms Community Concerns about POA

The USA position had been made very clear - they would not ratify the draft unless alterations were made. The statement by John R Bolton, United States Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control & International Security Affairs, at the Plenary on 9 July 2001 makes this clear. See: John Bolton's speech

I was delegated (read sent) late on Sunday night (10:30pm) to have 400 copies made of each of the eleven speeches to be ready for distribution the next morning to delegates at UN. The copy shop said "do I want to wait?"!! I returned two hours later to pick up the boxes of documents.

As we approached the UN buildings on Monday morning 16 July, there was a protest "march/display" by the anti-firearm groups including the line of empty shoes by Million Mom's March (photo) and many other displays. Heading in to the UN building area, we started logging in at 9:00am and it took about two hours to register, with photo ID cards being eventually issued. From there we went into the closed area of the UN where we gathered outside conference assembly hall 4. Only delegates and speakers were allowed into the main room with other NGOs like myself sitting in the gallery (which was full of mainly anti-firearm NGO's including Claire Taylor and Adele Kirsten of GFSA. The whole of the floor open to visitors and the section of open floor in the closed areas was allocated to displays from the anti-firearm groups. Videos, speakers at full volume with the noise of war and guns firing. The worst of the videos involved children.

Three hours were allocated on the Monday for all the NGO speeches and of that the pro-firearm lobbies were allowed forty minutes. The NRA and USA and UN delegations had protracted negotiations for equal time, pro and anti, and this was eventually agreed. For anyone with commonsense and logic the speeches went well for us. There was no clapping or response for any. See: List of Pro-firearm groups speaking & their speeches

Then the anti-firearm groups started. The first was Mrs Mary Blek of Million Mom's March with a very emotional speech which brought the gallery and delegates to their feet with rousing cries clapping and shouts of approval which set the stage for the others.

All the action outside the conference room took place in a large coffee shop where we lobbied our SA delegates, other African State delegates and as many others as we could. (photo) The NRA and Tom Mason seemed to have quite an influence over their delegates. The NRA however kept a very low key with emphasis rather on the WFSA. NRA's Wayne La Pierre made a brief appearance. We often discussed matters with Ric de Caris and the other members of the SA delegation. We felt we were kept well informed by our delegates.
Marco Granelli from the Star newspaper in SA was in New York for President Mbeki's visit and had stayed for the UN conference. He sat and spoke at length with us which resulted in a fair amount of media coverage. Alex Holmes had several interviews with Liz Neisloss of CNN. See press release: UN Arms Conference to Revise Draft

On the Tuesday evening the USA wanted an addition to the draft and passed copies out as follows: 
"TO BE INCLUDED IN THE PREAMBLE
Acknowledging in numerous States the legitimate use of possession of firearms by individuals for, inter alia, hunting, sport shooting and collecting and that nothing in the Program of Action should diminish or affect such interests or rights.”

The daily routine seemed to consist of sitting drinking coffee and trying to keep up with the many proposals from both sides. In the gallery, endless emotional suggestions were made by various delegates. This meant it was better to stay outside and wait for the written proposals and see and hear the discussions surrounding it by the lobbying groups.

Count Albi (Albrecht Gero Muth) of the EPG (Eminent Persons Group) approached us on the Wednesday and started to enlarge on what had been achieved and what he thought was going to happen. He requested that there be three meetings the following day, 1st meeting of the LONDON GROUP (I would assume similar make-up to the Paris Group), then in the afternoon the 2nd meeting of the PARIS GROUP (this group consisted of small arms manufacturers, trade associations, representatives of Canada, France, Nigeria, Russian Federation, and United States with Ambassador Camillo Reyes (Colombia) (President-Designate of the said UN Conference). Then on the Thursday night a combination of the two groups. The results of which would be influential on the President. I got the impression that Count Albi was a high-powered facilitator for the UN and that the decisions made at these meetings would affect the outcome of the UN agreement.
We were not a party to these meetings, but Tom Mason (both), Keith Tidswell (Paris), Carlo Peroni (both), Robert Glock (both), Richard Alexander (both), Guy Wilson (London) and other delegates were included. He  (Count Albi) stressed that unless the draft was toned down, it would fail and that the Conference President was looking to an agreement being reached, even a much watered-down version.

By Wednesday Alex Holmes had made contact with Larry Pratt (Gunowners of America). Larry arranged for us to be on his weekly live radio show. Alex came over very well - something like that in SA would be fantastic. It goes out live to about ten stations and is re-broadcast to at least a further ten or twelve.

On Thursday we headed for Washington DC on the Acila Express (train) which travels at over 150 miles per hour (250kms). Very smooth and quiet and much quicker and easier than catching a flight. In Washington we arranged a meeting with Heidi Cifelli at the NRA (Manager of the Eddie Eagle program). The NRA headquarters are stunning, the building is in blue glass and is about twice the size of the De Beers diamond building in Johannesburg. (pic) Security at the NRA is strict with photo IDs being arranged before admission. Discussions were held about SAGA adapting and using the Eddie Eagle Program and we now await feedback from the NRA. We were then taken to the NRA Firearm Museum. I took many pictures of exhibits and their donations board - $1,000,000 and up!

We left for SA on the Sunday and arrived home many hours later exhausted.

Alex, thank you very much for your assistance, company and input.

After much lengthy deliberation the conference did adopt an Action Programme. To view please CLICK HERE 

For more information on the conference you can visit the UN website at http://www.un.org/Depts/dda/CAB/smallarms/index.html

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