From 25 to 26 October 2021 in Brussels, Belgium, after a two-year pause due to the global COVID-19 pandemic, the Bureau of International Recycling hosted the Global Trading Forum 2021 in an offline format. The event was attended by Rusmet representatives.
The Forum brought together representatives of the international recycling community; more than 450 business people from 41 countries, representing about 300 companies, attended the event. The purpose of the Forum was, as ever, to establish new and develop existing business contacts, exchange professional views on the current situation and prospects in the international commodity markets.
The event was organised in a COVID-safe set-up. The participants were able to hold a large number of meetings and business negotiations throughout the entire business programme of the Forum and during the welcome reception.
An important element of the Forum programme was the interactive session The Challenge, with its host Michael Lion (Chair of the BIR’s International Trade Council), co-hosts Mark Sellier (Chair of the Communications Committee) and Murat Bayram (Chair of the Convention Committee), and George Adams (SA Recycling, USA) as the main guest. At the session, the experts discussed the main issues the global waste recycling industry is currently facing and answered questions of market participants. The Forum concluded with a networking lunch and further informal communication of guests until the end of the evening.
In his opening speech, Michael Lion pointed out that BIR members are unanimous in their views on the emerging threat of restrictions on free trade and export of secondary raw materials in several regions of the world. Murat Bayram spoke in detail about the negative consequences that the prospect of introducing new EU restrictions on exports of ferrous and non-ferrous metal scrap, which can damage dramatically the effective functioning of the European recycling industry.
Mr. Lion noted that if politicians are genuinely committed to the climate change and carbon reduction agenda, and the global circular economy as defined by the Paris Agreements, they have to ensure the free transfer of recycled materials through the supply chain. This will encourage consumers in emerging markets to increase their use of these more environmentally friendly materials rather than primary raw materials.
Thus, the hosts unanimously called for a strong expression of the BIR position, and the international recycling community to support the invaluable role of recycling industry and the need for restriction-free movement of recycled materials in the global supply chain. Chairs of the BIR committees believe it is crucial to work together to counter corporate lobbying, which is well-funded but misleads the global community, and to ensure a recycling-based decarbonisation path for the sustainable development of the global economy.
“While our online meetings have served us well over the last two years, there is absolutely no substitute for meeting face-to-face,” said BIR president Tom Bird. “Delegates had so much to catch up on with each other, not least the many changes to the business and regulatory environment since they had last met in Budapest in October 2019. Having spoken to many of the delegates in Brussels, the clear message was ‘It’s good to be back’”.
He continued: “It was not easy to make the Global Trading Session a reality but, as throughout the challenging period of the pandemic, BIR has done its utmost to offer more support than ever before to its global membership, including the opportunity to meet again in person at the earliest possible opportunity”.
In the following days, the event continued in the format of BIR Global eForum, which offered webinars covering all BIR product groups as well as the most important events within the BIR International Trade Council.
At the event Rusmet Rating Agency successfully presented the existing opportunities for information and analytical partnership with international participants in the commodity market and recycling industry, such as traders, equipment manufacturers, representatives of global scrap processing and metallurgical companies, as well as with national recycling associations and international organisations, including BIR. Many forum participants expressed great interest in the Moscow International Recycling Expo-2022, which will be held on April 12-14, 2022 in Moscow and organised by Rusmet. Various delegates of the Global Trading Forum expressed their interest in participating, placing their display stands, speaking at and supporting the event.
Association NSRO RUSLOM.COM is a long-term BIR member and regularly pays membership fees.
References:
The Bureau of International Recycling (BIR) is the only global federation for the recycling industry. Founded in 1948, it is represented in 70 countries, has 730 international members, including 39 national recycling associations and around 700 companies from the private sector. BIR comprises four Commodity Divisions: iron and steel, non-ferrous metals, paper and textiles; it has four commodity committees dealing with stainless steel and special alloys, plastics, tyres and rubber, and e-scrap.
RA Rusmet is a rating agency, founded in 2008, which develops in Russia a system of sectorial rating and analysis of the market, prices and their indices in the field of metal circulation, metal products, scrap and waste of ferrous and non-ferrous metals. The Agency provides a wide range of services, the main of them are analytical studies of the metal scrap market, prices in this market, as well as an assessment of the reliability of the scrap collectors and processors and traders.
Association NSRO RUSLOM.COM is the only official industry association of scrap processors in Russia with the national self-regulatory organisation status. The Association members are more than 300 companies from among the procurement divisions of metallurgical plants, independent processors, exporters and traders, which are leaders of the market and government programmes. Members of the Association NSRO RUSLOM.COM own 100% of the shredding capacity in Russia and 75% of the market in terms of consumption of steel scrap in Russia.
The Association’s mission is to ensure the resource and environmental security of Russia by means of returning recoverable materials to the economic turnover.
The Association’s goal is to create a high-tech metal recycling industry in Russia.
Contact details:
Alexey Kondratyev
Press Office, Rusmet Rating Agency
Address: Moscow, 2nd Kazachiy lane, 11, p. 1
Tel. +7 (499) 490-49-28
Mob. tel. +7 (903) 363-5393
Email a.kondratiev@rusmet.ru