CONSEIL — MARS 1920 



REPORT 



of 



the 13th Meeting of the Council. 



First Sitting: Tuesday, March 2nd, 1920 at 11 a. m. 



The President, Prof. O. Pettersson, in the Chair. 

 Present: the Members, Experts, etc. (list, p. 3). 



Under Point 1 of the Agenda (Opening of the Proceedings, Admini- 

 strative Report, Formation of Sections), the President, Prof. 0. Petters- 

 son, opened the sitting at 11 o'clock by saying: 



This meeting has been under preparation a long time, more than a year. 

 We hoped at first to assemble the Council in March or April last year, then in Sep- 

 tember or November. When at last the opening has been fixed for to-day, we are 

 indebted for this happy solution of a difficult question to the initiative of the British 

 Government and the energetic efforts of its Fishery Department and its able 

 representative here, Mr. Maurice. 



Although our usual meeting-place is Copenhagen, it is by no means unusual 

 to hold meetings in other countries-. Our first conferences were held in Stockholm 

 and Christiania. Afterwards we met in Edinburgh, in Stralsund, Hamburg and 

 Bremen, twice in Amsterdam. Our last meeting in London will be fresh in the 

 memory of everyone who attended it. The Central Bureau, which has to decide 

 the place of the meeting, after careful consideration found that we might easier 

 convoke the representatives from the countries at the western side of the North 

 Sea — England, Scotland, Belgium or France — if the Council this time assembled 

 in London. 



Under these circumstances the Central Bureau resolved thankfully to accept 

 the invitation to meet in London, and the more so because this invitation of the 

 British Government involved the prospect of a future extension of the international 

 co-operation to other countries with which we have long wished to co-operate. 

 These expectations have been splendidly fulfilled to-day when we have the pleasure 

 to see representatives from Finland and from France amongst us. 



The first acts of the Finnish Government after Finland had gained its 



