Dear Members,

The Society had a fantastic conference and excellent time in Iquitos, Peru. I would like to thank all of you who were there, both presenters and participants, for your support. Without you the conference would not have been such a success. On the behalf of the Society I would like to thank Bryan Brunner, Carla Black and David Lorence for organizing the speakers and their hands-on management of the whole set-up from beginning to end. I would like to extend a special thank you to Mr. Carlos Acosta, Mrs. Margarita Rios Chiong and Miss Rozana Paredes for their tremendous help in organizing the hotel venue, the dinners and the very much appreciated tours.

As usual we had our Board meeting at the conference, and I would like to take this opportunity to brief all members on what was discussed. The Treasurer's report showed that the Society has a good financial base and that surplus money is available. We all agreed to put more effort into our website, adding more pictures, especially of the non-Heliconia groups in Zingiberales.

As you all know by now we produced four issues of the Bulletin last year and we will continue to do so in the future. Sandra Barnes (Archivist) is working on an index of all previous articles for easier access by members to their topics of interest. The Society's Bulletin is produced by our members, for our members. We always welcome articles, long or short, from any of you. Please consider writing something and sending it to our Editors.

The membership numbers have been floating up and down, but we clearly saw that several members had not renewed their memberships. If you are already a member or interested in becoming one, please include an email address with your data so we can contact you easily when renewal time comes around. We are also looking into other payment methods to make paying membership dues easier.

Anders Lindstrom
President, Heliconia Society International

HSI Headquarters Address

Heliconia Society International
C/o Raymond F. Baker
Harold L. Lyon Arboretum
University of Hawai`i
3860 Manoa Road
Honolulu HI 96822-1180 USA
808-988-0455
808-988-0462 (Fax)