ON THE ROAD TO IPACK-IMA 2021

The IPACK-IMA project involving 40 Italian companies and more than 30 North African professionals attracted keen interest and generated a total of 377 B2B meetings with high levels of satisfaction on the part of both exhibitors and buyers.Strengthening the show’s international appeal, consolidating relations with business communities and maintaining an increasingly strong focus on the processing and packaging supply chain in the food sector are the goals of ‘on the road to IPACK-IMA’, the series of initiatives organised to  engage with exhibitors and visitors in the lead-up to IPACK-IMA 2021.The second appointment in the programme, devoted to international buyers from the Maghreb region (Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia) and Egypt, was held in Milan on 11 and 12 November with a packed programme of company visits and meetings. The programme began in Palazzo delle Stelline, where the IPACK-IMA exhibitors met North African buyers selected in cooperation with the Italian Trade Agency ITA. It then continued in the factories of several of the companies, who welcomed the guests and presented the details and functions of the cutting-edge technologies they will be exhibiting at the trade show, a foretaste of what will happen on a larger scale at IPACK-IMA itself.Buyers from the “Food, Fresh & Convenience” and “Liquid Food & Beverage” categories visited: Sacchital, a specialist in flexible packaging solutions with materials capable of extending shelf life; Goglio, a company focused on flexible packaging of liquid, solid and powdered products and aseptic packaging of fresh food; and Smigroup, a leader in the packaging machine and bottling plant sector catering for production requirements of up to 36,800 bottles/hour. For the “Pasta, Bakery & Milling” category, one of the core sectors of IPACK-IMA, the guests met Italpast, a company specialising in plant and machinery for the production of fresh, dry, gluten-free and high-protein pasta, and Ocrim, a historic producer of milling plants, feed mills and cereal processing plants, from raw materials handling through to transformation of the finished product.North Africa is a dynamic and rapidly evolving market, especially in the foodpackaging sector. Egypt and Algeria in particular have excellent prospects with growth forecasts of +4.3% and +5% respectively for the three-year period 2019-2021 (source: Ipack Ima Monitor based on UCIMA Research Department data). The initiatives held in the lead-up to 2021 will consolidate the IPACK-IMA platform. The On the road to IPACK-IMAand MEAT-TECH programme, successfully launched with events devoted to Mexico and North Africa, will continue over the next few months with initiatives aimed at the Middle East and Turkey in March 2020, to be followed by Russia and Eastern Europe. The buyers program of IPACK-IMA 2021 is addressed to top decision makers from the entire massmarket and consumer durables industries, willing to invest in next-gen technologies and innovative materials for packaging and processing. A dedicated help desk will be activated in the next few months for all professionals who request to be qualificated as part of the Buyer program.To know more about selection requirements and the special advantages offered to IPACK-IMA guests, please write to: buyers@ipackima.itPhoto: IPACK-IMA