Who we are
The Murcian Association for the Study of Palaeoanthropology and the Quaternary, MUPANTQUAT, is a non-profit organization dedicated to Quaternary studies and heritage in Murcia (S.E.Spain).

Our aims
Our Association’s aims are to promote, stimulate, develop and advance scientific, cultural and social activities, as widely as possible, which are related to the study and diffusion of the Quaternary and Palaeoanthropology, paying attention to human, palaeontological, archaeological, palaeoenvironmental, geological, and palaeoecological remains, and offering assistance in Murcia to organizations, institutions and activities with similar concerns.

Activities
To achieve those aims the Association will develop such activities as may serve to promote, stimulate, develop or assist activities, methodologies and developments in the study of Palaeoanthropology and the Quaternary, offer assistance to those organizations and institutions in the Murcian Region involved in similar matters, and undertake activities such as excavations, field-work, and palaeoanthropological, archaeological, palaeontological, palaeoenvironmental or geological studies concerning the Quaternary, and the preparation of material for scientific study or public display, as well as fostering those activities and the diffusion, publication, reproduction and documentation of findings, and journeys and exchanges in order to promote collaboration or scientific or cultural representation, and to promote courses of study, excursions, visits, or other appropriate activities.

In 2013 the Association’s Committee is:
Chair: Michael J. Walker
Vice-chair: María Haber Uriarte
Secretary: Mariano Vicente López Martínez
Treasurer: Jesús García Torres
Voting Members: Antonio López Jiménez, Jon Ortega Rodrigáñez, Ignacio Martín Lerma.

How the Association came into being

The initiative to set up the Association arose early in 2012 in conversation with a political representative of the Murcian Regional Autonomous Government. Statutes of Association were drawn up in accordance with legal requirements. A provisional Standing Committee presented them for official registration on May 9 ^th 2012 and signed the proposal for the Act of Establishment. On June 27^th2012 the Statutes were inscribed formally in the Murcian Regional Government Register of Associations. This then permitted recognition of the Association for fiscal effects by the Spanish Government Treasury (Hacienda Pública) in July 2012; after June 27^th2014 (2 years from its registration) the Association can request that donors in Spain may claim tax deductions.

The Act of Establishment declares that: “The creation of the Murcian Association for the Study of Palaeoanthropology and the Quaternary is the outcome of due consideration for establishment in Murcia of a not-for-profit entity in order to promote, stimulate, develop and assist such scientific, cultural or social activities as may, in the broadest of terms, have relation and collaboration with the development of the study, research, and diffusion of Quaternary palaeoanthropology at regional, national and international levels, giving particular attention to human, palaeontological, archaeological, palaeoenvironmental, geological and palaeogeographical findings, and to sites and stations from which they come. The signatories are to draw up an agreement to collaborate with the Murcia Archaeological Museum and to provisionally establish there its official address.”