The four-day general meeting, held in New Delhi, was noted for the high profile of the delegates as well as the relevance of the issues addressed which ranged from challenges posed by the new quality regime of EU to the marketing scenarios in the galloping economies of China and India. Health and environmental concerns also dominated the deliberations especially during the meetings of the executive and the standing committees.
The presentations mainly related to developments in elastomers, petrochemicals, economic analysis, market and various challenges ahead of the SR community. Ramamurthy, the outgoing president of the IISRP, hoped that the knowledge shared would definitely contribute to the benefit of the SR and transport industry.
Speaking to Rubber Asia, James L. McGraw, managing director and CEO of IISRP, said the Delhi meet was one of the most outstanding AGMs. “The need for more epidemiological studies and challenges posed by the REACH (Regulation, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals) as per EU norms as well as the health concerns dominated the agenda of the AGM”, he added. In fact, McGraw and his staff and colleagues could be genuinely proud of making the meet one of the momentous events in the annals of IISRP’s history.
The AGM also saw Vasily Nomokonov, the youthful and dynamic technocrat from Russia, the hub of SR industry, taking over as the new president of the IISRP from K. Ramamurthy, president of Reliance Industries Ltd. India.
A major share of the credit of successfully organising the Delhi AGM should go to
Ramamurthy and his team. “Global trade is balancing and there are incremental commerce shifts to Asia; newer facilities are getting located in Asia with feed stock and market advantages,” he told Rubber Asia adding that SR is a “service industry to the transportation sector.”
Ramamurthy said: “The basic purpose of the institute is to actively promote and further the interest of manufacturers of SR and polymers safely and meet the increasing expectations of the tyre industry. Currently, the challenges ahead of IISRP are in the areas of aromatic oil replacement, international standardisation and epidemiological studies in addition to meet REACH as per EU norms. It is also working on revision of industrial safety, health law on chemical substances generally used in the rubber industry and to bring in the best practices.
According to him, the tyre industry is fast growing, particularly in Asia and tagging with the ‘transportation’ industry. “I am convinced that the SR industry has good growth prospects in the light of total rubber consumption and the somewhat stagnation of NR.
“There is an imperative need for investment in India in SR to meet the domestic demand”, he said adding that Reliance will definitely participate in this growth
Food for thought
S. Suryanarayan, vice president of Reliance Industries, in his presentation gave a comprehensive overview of the Indian rubber industry. The paper pointed out that Indian rubber consumption was to touch 2.1 million tonnes by 2020. It was observed that more investments are required in the tyre/SR sector pointing out that consumption of SR is to go up remarkably and India is likely to be a net importer of NR in the coming years.
The panel discussion on regional economic overview was one of the liveliest at the AGM. Gaurav Kapur, of ABN AMRO Bank, dealt on the economy of Europe while Wandderli Passarrela and Yoichiro Hibiya of ETIC Inc. in Japan made presentations on the economy of the Americas and the Far East respectively.
The newly elected president Nomokonov will also serve as the European section president of IISRP. Speaking to Rubber Asia on the sidelines of the AGM, Nomokonov said he would like to see that the institute has a broader platform during his tenure. He would also like to see that Russia continues to play a vital role in the growth of global SR industry. Confidence to live up to the expectations of the global SR community was writ large on his smiling face.
The 49th general meeting will be held next year in Moscow.
