Don Burnside A/ Membership Officer. Email: don.burnside@iinet.net.au
Our membership at 31 December 2022
As at 31 December 2022, there were 206 members of the ARS, including 32 complimentary members. One hundred and seventy four members (174) were financial for 2022. This is an increase from the 2021 membership where there were 196 financial members at the end of the year.
Forty members (40) members have paid to the end of either 2023 or 2024, and one complimentary member has donated the value of his membership for 2022.
Nine (9) members who did not renew in 2022 have been removed from the active list, given they were advised that 30 November was the ‘close off date’. Some of these will continue to receive issues of Vol 44 of the journal until that volume concludes in April 2023. Sadly, one valued and very active member passed away late in 2022.
Membership at 31 December 2022
| Category | Hardcopy Journal | E-journal | Total |
| Complimentary members in 2022* | 8* | 24 | 32 |
| Financial members in 2022 | 85 | 89 | 174 |
| ARS members | 93 | 113 | 206 |
| Institutional subscribers to the Journal | 10 | 79 | 89 |
| Grand total | 103 | 192 | 295 |
* one complimentary member has donated the equivalent of his membership for 2022
New members
We have welcomed 20 new members in 2022. The new members include:
- Five people who attended the joint ARS/ Desert Channels Queensland Conference in Longreach 2021 responded to an invitation to join;
- Four new Company members;
- Six new Standard members;
- Two members who have re-joined after a lengthy absence;
- One student; and
- Two (should this be 3) new complimentary members (incoming Chair of the Publications Committee and incoming Website and Social Media Editors).
Complimentary members
At 31 December 2022, the Society had 32 complimentary members, as shown in the table below. As noted above, one of these complimentary members pays annual subscriptions, which is generous and appreciated. Three complimentary members whose membership expired at 31 December 2022 have been invited to continue as financial members in 2023.
ARS Membership update – as at 13 March 2023
Changes in membership introduced in 2023.
Cessation of publication of The Rangeland Journal in hard copy
After 46 years of publication, and 44 volumes of The Rangeland Journal, sadly, hardcopy publication will come to an end with the last issue of Volume 44, which is expected to come off the presses in early 2023. There are three main reasons for this change.
- A majority of members of the Australian Rangeland Society are now receiving The Rangeland Journal in electronic form, which means they access it via the members’ area on the ARS website, which also enables them to download papers at no cost. Further, nearly all institutional subscribers to the Journal access the electronic version.
- As a consequence of this move to an ‘electronic Journal’, there were only 93 members receiving hardcopy issues of the Journal in the post. CSIRO Publishing advised that it is becoming increasingly difficult financially to justify a hardcopy print run for this small number of copies. Printing and posting the Journal is a significant financial burden on the Society.
- The move to on-line issues of scientific journals is occurring rapidly across the world, and we need to keep up with this trend if the Journal is able to build its credibility and recognition in an increasingly busy environment.
Move to automatic renewal of membership
To improve the efficiency of membership renewal, and to reduce the difficulty experienced by some members in renewing, the ARS Council decided to commence offering automatic renewals of membership in 2023, when a member’s renewal date occurs.
Those members who did not wish for automatic renewal will be contacted directly.
Renewals
Unfortunately, the auto-renewal of memberships was not as successful as we hoped although it did enable many members to be renewed painlessly!
Renewals have continued, although many people are having trouble updating their credit card details within their account in the Members’ area. We apologise sincerely for the difficulties being experienced. We are working with Blue Platypus for assistance on these matters as a matter of urgency. Some progress is being made, and we will be in contact with those people still to renew.
The good news though is we now have 100 financial members paid up for 2023 (or beyond) which represents 56 per cent of those who need to pay in 2023.
Further good news is that we have two new members who have joined so far this year!
Membership at 13 March 2023
| Category | Standard | Concessional | Company | Student | Total |
| Complimentary members for 2023 | 27 | 27 | |||
| Financial members in 2023 | 66 | 17 | 15 | 2 | 100 |
| Still to pay | 68 | 5 | 4 | 1 | 78 |
| ARS members | 161 | 22 | 19 | 3 | 205 |
| Institutional subscribers to the Journal | 89 | 89 | |||
| Grand total | 250 | 22 | 19 | 3 | 294 |
The membership for 2023 includes the following Complimentary members, being our Fellows, those receiving honoraria for providing services to the Society, and the Associate Editors of The Rangeland Journal. The full list is shown below.
| Complimentary Members in 2023 | Number |
| Fellows of the ARS | 6 |
| Past Fellows of the ARS | 1 |
| Chair of the Publications Committee | 1 |
| Editor in Chief, The Rangeland Journal | 1 |
| Editor, Range Management Newsletter | 1 |
| Editor, ARS Website | 1 |
| Editor, ARS Social Media | 1 |
| Associate Editors, The Rangeland Journal | 15 |
| Total | 27 |