The Society encourages its members to enter the competitions for the following two international, OR-related awards:

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The IFORS Prize for OR in Development

This prize is awarded at the close of each IFORS Triennial Conference for the best paper on a topic in which Operations Research is harnessed for development, and currently carries with it a grand prize of US $4000 and a runner-up prize of US $2000 as well as publication of the winning papers in the scholarly journal International Transactions in Operational Research. The following criteria apply:

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• The paper should describe a practical OR application in a developing country, conducted to assist a specific organization in its decision-making process, with original features in methodology or implementation.

• If selected to be among the finalists, the entry should be presented by one of the principal authors during the IFORS Triennial Conference.

• The paper should include some description of the application's social context and its impact on the decision-making process or on the organization for which it was conducted. Where appropriate, the relevance of the country's state of development to the study should be addressed. A stress on developmental issues is an important factor in the judging. Papers of a purely technical nature, or those which have no relevance in the developmental context, are typically not considered.

• Winners are selected on the basis of problem definition, creativity and appropriateness of approach, MS/OR content, stress on developmental issues, impact of the study, paper organization and structure and quality of written and (if selected as finalist) oral presentation.

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The Franz Edelman Award

The Franz Edelman Award competition is organised by INFORMS and recognizes outstanding examples of innovative operations research that improves organisations - and often change people's lives. This annual competition brings together top examples of innovation from large and small, profit and non-profit, corporate and governmental, American and international organisations. The common theme characterising all the final competing teams is use of the most sophisticated analytical tools employed in operations research to make a major impact on an organization and the people that it serves. The competition carries US $15000 in awards; the first prize is accompanied by a US $10000 honorarium.