Introduction The Geophysical Institute at Quetta is directed by Mr S. N. Naqvi, Director of the Meteorological Service.. It may be said to have been established on 1951 December 26, when the first accurately timed seismograms were recorded, but the specially built laboratories and instrument rooms (the foundations of which were laid in October 1952) were not completely occupied until September 1953. The Institute is 56ooft above sea-level at the base of a ~ o o o o f t peak 5 miles west of Quetta. Laboratory and instrument room space of 12 ooo square feet, and 5 ooo square feet of library, workshop, service and store rooms, were designed and sited by UNESCO advisers and built by the Pakistan Government on seismic resistant principles enforced by law in Quetta. Plans for the Institute were initiated in 1950 by Mr Mohammad Aslam, former Director Meteorological Service, and by Dr Malcolm Adiseshiah, Chief of the Technical Assistance Department, UNESCO (now Assistant Director General). The intention was to create a centre in Pakistan for the geophysical study of the Earth and its atmosphere. Atmospheric physics, geodesy, geomagnetism, and seismology were to be the basic fields of activity; geodesy and the absolute field geomagnetic survey being executed by the Survey of Pakistan. The basic agreement between Pakistan and UNESCO was signed in the autumn of 1950. It provided four consultants in the basic fields, pilot and demonstration equipment to the value of $35 ooo and 6 fellowships. Each year since 1951 UNESCO has continued to support the Institute with consultants, equipment and fellowships. The Meteorological Service built and equipped the Geophysical Institute at a cost of about $IZOOOO and in addition has set up seismological observatories at Karachi, Lahore and Warsak Dam (near Peshawar) in West Pakistan, and Chittagong and Sylhet in East Pakistan. It now plans to build a student hostel at Quetta and a similar Institute at Chittagong to serve East Pakistan. From 1955 the Survey of Pakistan, directed by Mr M. N. A. Hashmie, expanded its co-operation with the United Nations through another Specialized Agency, UNTAA, to include photogrammetry and the manufacture of survey instruments. Assistance in the geodetic work was then transferred to UNTAA for administrative convenience. New laboratories for the Geodetic Institute of the Survey of Pakistan are expected to be built in Quetta within the next two years. The photogrammetric work of the Survey of Pakistan at Rawalpindi is based on an air photo survey of all West Pakistan (save the high Karakoram region) on a