International Society for Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering (ISSMGE) Report
Prepared by Graham Scholey, Rolando Orense, Meenakshi Patel
The ISSMGE (https://www.issmge.org/) is the pre-eminent professional body representing the interests and activities of Engineers, Academics, and Contractors all over the world who actively participate in geotechnical engineering. The ISSMGE is a global organisation that provides a focus for professional leadership to some 90 Member Societies and over 21,000 individual members. In addition, there are currently 46 Corporate Associates.
The current Vice-president of ISSMGE for Australasia is Graham Scholey. There are only two societies in our region, NZGS and the Australian Geomechanics Society (AGS), but we have the largest per capita membership of any of the regions. Our societies are highly active, offering our members opportunities to attend lectures by eminent local and overseas speakers, attend high-quality training courses, access well-regarded journals, and attend conferences.
ISSMGE Membership
The number of NZ Geotechnical Society members affiliated with the ISSMGE continues to grow. As of September 2024, 1,067 of us are ISSMGE members, making us the largest national society (per capita). The benefits of membership include:
- possibility to submit papers to many conferences and symposia
- lower conference registration fees
- possibility of membership in one of the many technical committees working on specific topics
- access to work of ISSMGE in various fields of activity, including Education, Communications, Technology Transfer
- opportunities to demonstrate leadership in Technical Committee (TC), conferences, and other activities
- opportunities to build lasting worldwide relationships
- a clear demonstration of interest and professionalism in the field of Geotechnics.
Increasing regional membership in Australasia
This is a shared initiative of AGS and NZGS to engage with geotechnical professionals in Fiji and encourage the formation of a new national geotechnical society to represent Fijian geotechnical engineers. While plans are being hatched, these will be reported in due course. For any ideas or connections in Fiji and other South Pacific Islands, everyone is encouraged to contact the ISSMGE VP (Graham Scholey) or the NZGS ISSMGE Representative (Rolando Orense).
Heritage Time Capsule project
The ISSMGE Heritage Time Capsule (HTC) website is a collection of contributions from individuals and groups belonging to the ISSMGE. These contributions aim to capture the history of the Society and its present goals and are designed to be useful for the present and future generations of geotechnical scientists and engineers. There are four phases to the project:
Phase 1: Contributions – from Member Societies, Technical Committees, Corporate Associates, Past Presidents, and other champions of the Society. The contributions are all in electronic format, including video recordings, commented slide presentations, text documents, and articles.
Phase 2: Discovery – in which individual members or teams prepare a brief report to spotlight a particular Contribution(s) for sharing with our members. The HTC team is actively seeking your Discovery reports!
Phase 3: Time Capsule – a physical time capsule for storage of physical materials, to be sealed at the next international conference in Vienna in June 2026.
Phase 4: 100 years on – a project to reflect in a dynamic way both the past century of geotechnical engineering and the anticipated nature and needs of geotechnical engineering in the next 100 years.
Further details are available on the HTC website: https://htc.issmge.org/what-is-htc.
Geo-Engineers without Borders
The ISSMGE “Geo-engineers Without Borders” Committee (GeoWB) is a concept introduced by President Marc Ballouz. The purpose is to send volunteer Geo-engineers from the ISSMGE network (around 90 countries and 37 Technical Committees) over the world to areas that have been affected by a Geo-disaster, such as earthquakes, landslides, floods, failure of dykes, dam and tailing dams, and collapse of geotechnical structures.
The initiative is geared towards offering global competency to countries that have experienced a natural disaster and may not have the technical expertise in-country to be able to respond. GeoWB has made a Voluntary Commitment within the framework of the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR).
Earlier this year Jan Kupec represented ISSMGE under the GeoWB banner by travelling to PNG to assist following a major landslide that was widely reported in the media. You can read about Jan’s contribution in the ISSMGE Bulletin (https://www.issmge.org/publications/issmge-bulletin/vol-18-issue-2-june-2024).
Technical committees
Many members of the New Zealand Geotechnical Society are involved with the ISSMGE Technical Committees (TC) (https://www.issmge.org/committees/technical-committees). If you would like to get involved, you can apply to be a nominated member, but only two candidates per member society are permitted. Otherwise, you can be a corresponding member (and hope that a position becomes vacant). If interested, please contact the NZGS Secretary and make sure you are a member of both NZGS and ISSMGE. Nominations can only be made by Member Societies, not by individuals.
ISSMGE is re-establishing two Technical Committees. These are:
- TC 207 (Soil-Structure Interaction and Retaining Walls)
- TC 208 (Slope Stability)
If you want to know more about the Technical Committees and how you can get involved, you can refer to the ISSMGE website (https://www.issmge.org/committees/technical-committees). Our thanks to our local representatives and contributing members of the Technical Committees.
21st ICSMGE 2026
The 21st International Conference on Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering (21 ICSMGE 2026) will take place from June 14-19, 2026, in Vienna, Austria. We cordially invite you to participate and actively contribute! An important part of the conference is your written contributions; the accepted papers will be published in the conference proceedings, which will be in digital form only. In addition to the number of papers allocated to NZGS, there will be a Young Engineers Session, and we would encourage our young geo-professionals to submit high-quality papers.
Information and current updates are available on the conference website: www.icsmge2026.org. The deadline for abstract submission is 30 November 2024. All submissions must be entered in the ConfTool system (www.conftool.pro/icsmge2026).
ISSMGE Awards
• The Terzaghi Oration – is to be delivered at each ISSMGE International Conference as a tribute to Professor Karl Terzaghi, the first President of the International Society. This Oration shall be given at each International Conference and shall be accorded a position of importance in the programme of events. The Terzaghi Oration should preferably cover case histories derived from professional activities and explore the dynamic interaction between consulting work, teaching, research, and publication. It should exemplify Prof. Terzaghi’s intellectual approach to engineering and Geology and to the observational method both for improving design and for the advancement of knowledge. The Orator shall have made distinctive and outstanding contributions to Geotechnical engineering.
• The Kevin Nash Gold Medal – is awarded in memory of Professor Kevin Nash, Secretary General of the International Society (1965-1981). The medal is awarded to a person who, through distinction as an engineer, through international contributions to engineering practice and education, through contributions to international goodwill, and through service to the Society, has made a major contribution to fostering the ideals and goals of the International Society for Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering throughout the world.
The deadline for both nominations is 28 February 2025.
In addition, the ISSMGE currently offers the following awards to recognise those individuals and bodies who have made important contributions to our profession, society, and the world:
- Lifetime Achievement Medal
- Outstanding Technical Committee
- Outstanding Geotechnical Project
- Outstanding Innovator
- Outstanding Member Society
- Outstanding Paper Published in the International Journal of Geo-Engineering Case Histories
- Outstanding Public Relations Award
- Outstanding Young Geotechnical Engineer Award
- Bright Spark Lecture
Details of each award are available here: https://www.issmge.org/the-society/issmge-awards
ISSMGE Activities
See the ISSMGE website – http://www.issmge.org/ for full details of all ISSMGE activities.
