Constitution
The hierarchical structure of the GWG has recently changed (August 2013). Now the GWG is comprised by 2 chapters: The European chapter (EGWG) and the North American chapter (NAGWG). The board of each chapter is comprised by 5 people. Both chapters act independently in organizing their meetings and many other things, but cooperate in the main goals. For the big decisions, these 2 boards form one international board that is completed by the head of the Aqualab in Morelia.
So we have:
The board of the EGWG (in alphabetical order):
Alain Grioche (F)
Michael Köck (A)
Nigel Hunter (UK)
Kees de Jong (NL)
Thue Grum-Schwensen (DK)
The board of the NAGWG (in alphabetical order):
Joel Healy (USA)
John Lyons (USA)
Kyle Piller (USA)
Leslie Dick (USA)
Richard Forcier (USA)
and finally the head of the Aqualab in Morelia:
Furthermore we have established in the EGWG a number of regional groups, guided by a regional group coordinator (RGC) each. The role of these coordinators is to express a link between board and breeding members. He or she is the first contact in regional affairs like the distribution of surplus or the organisation of meetings. At the moment, the EGWG is subdivided in 15 regions (except the Uruguayan group are all European groups). The regional groups (in alphabetical order) and the corresponding RGCs are:
Austria: Michael Köck
Czechia and Slovakia: Roman Slaboch
France (including Andorra and parts of Belgium): Alain Grioche
Germany: Horst Kleine
Hungary: Balázs Horvath
Italy: Alessio Arbuatti
Netherlands (including parts of Belgium): Kees de Jong
Poland: Krzystof Kelman
Portugal: Miguel Andrade
Scandinavia: Thue Grum-Schwensen
Slovenia: Gasper Gomboc
Spain: Eduardo Obis Alberola
Switzerland: André Scheiwiller
The United Kingdom: Nigel Hunter
Uruguay: Nicolás Carrasco
The first contact for the NAGWG is John Lyons
Until April 2013, one of the tasks of the regional group coordinators had been to collect species- and population-lists from the members, as well as names and data of breeders. Now there is a species, population and breeders database working and each member is required to add his stock to the database directly. This database has been set up to gather a worldwide stocklist of Goodeid strains and species as big as possible, and a list of breeders all over the world to give members the possibility to locate and get looked-for strains or species and to generate going out of these data a so-called target species ranking (TSR). More information about this ranking, you can find here. In the database is also included a literature database, going to be built up at the moment. To collect all literature items concerning Goodeids, we have elected a so-called literature coordinator. We try to collect as many literature as possible, scientific literature as well as hobbyist-literature. This person is Kees de Jong (NL).