The new co-ordinator of the Business English Special Interest Group of IATEFL (International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language) is Maltese-born Evan Frendo, now resident in Berlin, Germany.

Mr Frendo was born in Malta in 1962 and went to St Aloysius College before attending Sandhurst, which led to a 10-year spell in the British Army.

Since 1993 he has been living in Berlin with his wife and three children, and is currently a partner in a company which specialises in teaching English for business.

He has also written Business English course books for different publishers, and has worked extensively on in-house material for various companies.

The Business English Special Interest Group of IATEFL is a professional body representing the interests and serving the needs of the international business English teaching community. With other Special Interest Groups, BESIG forms part of the International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language.

BESIG's members (around 700) are mainly teachers of business English and include both native and non-native speakers of English. Most members come from Europe, but there are over 60 countries in total represented, including countries in South America, Africa and Asia.

BESIG offers ways for teachers to improve their expertise in teaching business English and a link with other people in the profession. This is done through an annual international BESIG conference, regional workshops, regular newsletters and reports describing conference papers/workshops in detail.

Readers interested in IATEFL and joining BESIG can find out more about it on www.iatefl.org, or contact Mr Frendo at evanfrendo@e4b.de.