Update on waste management policies and programmes

We should like to use this opportunity to highlight three important developments at the NEA. First, the NEA - in co-operation with the CEC and the IAEA - organized a Symposium on the Safety Assessment of Radioactive Waste Repositories in October 1989. Results of this Symposium have strongly influenced the NEA's programme of work over the course of 1990. An extensive summary of the Symposium - which attracted approximately 300 participants from 19 OECD Member countries and an additional 15 non-Member countries - is provided as a special Topical Report in this issue of the Bulletin. A second important development at NEA is the redirection of the work of the Advisory Group on In Situ Research and Investigations for Geological Disposal (ISAG), to place more emphasis on international co-operation in the area of site evaluation and design of experiments. The last point to be noted here is concerned with recent global economic and political developments, and, specifically, the political opening of the East European countries and the continued rapid economic expansion of the Southeast Asian area. These developments have led to increasing contacts between these countries and the OECD, and it is possible that these contacts will lead to applications for membership sometime in the future