Welcome from the Chair

It is a great honour but a difficult challenge to succeed to Allan Findlay as Chair of the Commission on Population Geography.

It is impressive to realize just how busy our commission has been under his leadership. Fortunately I’m not alone and, following the Köln conference, I would like to thank most heartedly Prof. Jianfa Shen (Hong-Kong) who accepted to take the Vice-chair and Dr. Nikola Sander (Austria) who accepted, not only to step-in as a new commission member, but also as new Secretary of the Commission. I also would like to welcome two new members: Dr. Darren Smith (UK) and Prof. Satoshi Nakagawa (Japan).

In the years to come, my hope is to maintain the high level of activity that characterized our commission and to enlarge the membership and the diffusion of the Newsletter. The commission’s overall aim will remain unchanged; it is to enhance the understanding of population issues from the perspective of research undertaken by geographers. While nurturing research across the full breadth of population geography, the specific mission of the commission over the next four years will be to engage in greater depth on three specific themes. The first two continue from previous work on “Population and Vulnerability” and “Population and Difference”. The third theme will explore the issue of “Spatial Population Data – Continuity and Change”. I’m convinced that the numerous events scheduled for the years to come will give us many opportunities of lively discussion on those themes. —Etienne Piguet