The 21th International Geochemical Exploration Symposium (21th IGES) was held in Dublin, Ireland during August 28～September 3, 2003. Over 200 delegates from 27 nations attended the meeting. Fifty-eight papers were orally presented and fifty papers were posted at the meeting. In addition to the scientific program, the Annual General Meeting of the AEG (Association of Exploration Geochemits) passed a resolution for the name change from AEG to AAG (Association of Applied Geochemits). Conventional geochemical exploration techniques such as soil and stream sediment surveys have been playing an important role in mineral exploration, while lithogeochemistry and hydrogeochemistry are still lasting interests for geochemists. A great attention has being paid to the study of deep-penetrating techniques and its formation mechanism in overburden, which represents the future of exploration geochemistry, in the world recently; indicator minerals, isotopes and biogeochemical methods were studied for particular mineral deposits in the special landscapes, Canada and Australia. ICP/MS has been conventional procedures for the analysis of elements and isotopes in geochemical samples. Although the number of papers on environmental geochemistry was increased, most of them were related to the environmental geochemistry of mines or mineral deposits.
