UNIDO ITPO ITALY at 12th Edition of ECOMONDO fair The 12th edition of ECOMONDO, International Trade Fair of Material & Energy Recovery and Sustainable Development, took place in Rimini, from 5th to 8th November 2008. At this edition of the Fair, and with the aim of encouraging business partnerships and strengthening economic and industrial relations between companies operating in several developing countries and Italy, UNIDO ITPO Italy, with the support of the Investment Promotion Units in Egypt, Morocco, Jordan, and Tunisia, coordinated and assisted a delegation of 15 foreign SMEs to over 150 business meetings. With over 64,500 attendees and more than 1,000 exhibiting firms, ECOMONDO 2008 provided foreign companies with a unique platform to forge partnerships, examine potential joint-venture agreements, as well as see the widest range of technical opportunities, systems, equipment, and services for solving complicated specific environmental problems. To favour the establishment of positive and effective business relations between Italian and foreign companies, UNIDO ITPO Italy carried-out a match-making exercise in response to the business proposals/requests of the attendees. As a consequence of these activities, business meetings took place between companies from Italy and from Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, and Jordan, under the supervision of UNIDO staff and with the support of professional interpreters. Of about 15 participating foreign companies, some engaged interesting business negotiations that are currently being followed-up with Italian partners regarding, in particular, E-waste recycling and the production of various kinds of soap in the organic cosmetics line. Further, the Fair enabled some companies to explore opportunities for future collaboration in the waste water treatment and wind industries. The first one involves Morocco and Italy in a waste water treatment project, with an approximate investment of â‚Ź 7,000,000, and the second one, joins two enterprises for the production of a wind power generator in Egypt and in Tunisia, using Italian technology. By exchanging experiences and best practice during these meetings, a number of companies started some negotiations, such as a Tunisian company that will learn from an Italian counterpart new techniques to measure and certify power efficiency in buildings in return for exporting its eco-friendly building materials. Another concrete example of the results of these meetings is a Moroccan company that will be able to switch from paper recycling to plastics recycling, thanks to the transfer of know-how from an Italian counterpart. Finally, UNIDO ITPO Italy also obtained good results from assisting foreign companies, mainly by helping them to recognise their strengths and weaknesses and then to act accordingly. Furthermore, ITPO Italy persisted in cooperating and developing industrial partnerships, and this bore fruit, as when ITPO Italy finally found an Italian counterpart to an Egyptian food company, a long-time client of ours, which had been seeking a partner in catalyst recycling. Annual Report 2008
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UNIDO ITPO Italy