Mission and Strategy

Mission
ICON is an international, multi-stakeholder organization whose mission is to develop and communicate information regarding potential environmental and health risks of  nanotechnology, thereby fostering risk reduction while maximizing societal benefit.

ICON Fact Sheet (pdf)

Activities
ICON sponsored activities are organized around projects in four areas of emphasis:

• forums and events to explore health and environmental risk issues in nanotechnology
• an electronic knowledge base for accessing peer-reviewed publications in nanotechnology
• high-quality technical information relevant to decision makers in nanotechnology
• proactive communications platform that translates complex scientific data into material easily understood by many stakeholders.

Decisions about ICON’s governance and program priorities are made with balanced inputs from four stakeholder sectors active within the organization:

• Government
• Academia
• Industry
• Non-governmental organizations 

Strategic Plan
The goals, strategies, actions and responsibilities for each of the objectives given below are defined in the ICON Strategic Plan.

• Create a multi-stakeholder, international and neutral forum for exploring health and environmental risk issues.
• Establish and maintain a globally recognized, credible knowledge base (contextual summaries of research publications, access to experts, roadmap for future research needs and capabilities) of nanotechnology EHS peer reviewed information.
• Facilitate and develop activities producing or using information in support of nanotechnology health and environmental risk assessment and management
• Broadly communicate the results of ICON’s efforts and translate complex scientific concepts into material that can be understood by a broad cross section of stakeholders.

The International Council on Nanotechnology (ICON) is a credible, international, and multi-stakeholder organization for catalyzing global activities that lead to sound and responsible risk assessment, management, and communications.  ICON works in an open and transparent manner and reaches decisions by consensus.  It is a technically-driven organization and does not engage in advocacy or commercial activities.