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10/06/2006
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9th International Symposium SIL- cinco días
Brufau affirms that hydrocarbon logistics is a strategic factor for the world economy
Commissioner Barrot defends intermodality as key to logistics mobility
Antoni Brufau, CEO of Repsol YPF, and Jacques Barrot, Vice-President of the European Commission and the Transport Commissioner of the Union were the key guests in a meeting that brought together the main professionals of the sector and which once more closed with a resounding success in participation.
The International Logistics and Material Handling Exhibition staged the 9th edition of the International Symposium SIL- Cinco Días, presented this year under the title Where is logistics going towards?
The keynote speaker for the opening session was the CEO of Repsol YPF, Antoni Brufau, who in his speech gave a general view of the complex current panorama of hydrocarbon logistics. According to Brufau, “the existing balance between the production and consumption areas makes hydrocarbon logistics a strategic factor for the world economy”. The CEO of the oil company insisted that “the logistics apparatus enables the origin of oil and gas to be diversified and stored as a way to stay off interruptions in supplies, so it is of vital importance for any country”.
In his speech, Brufau also stressed “the importance of hydrocarbon storage for western countries, a key aspect for facing possible problems that might occur in the fairly unstable countries on which we depend for supplies”.
The closing session of the symposium was given by an exceptional guest, the Vice-President of the European Commission and the Transport Commissioner of the Union Jacques Barrot. The Commissioner strongly praised the present and future of the logistics sector, which he said accounted for “14% of the GDP” of the Union. After congratulating the organisation of the SIL for “the magnificent meeting of European logistics that is the SIL”, Barrot assured that “logistics is essential for the competitiveness of European companies”.
He announced the forthcoming presentation of the White Book on Transport, to be followed by a Communication on Logistics “where the obstacles on its development will be identified” and which will contain a Plan of Action that will place the emphasis on “the creation of infrastructures and units of intermodal exchange”. Barrot mentioned the challenge of “more energetically economical logistic mobility” as one of the priorities of community policy, and stressed that the key to achieving it is the development of intermodality in the transport and distribution operations.
Italy, a guest country in the SIL 2006
The Symposium this year was structured on a single day and in four sessions, with special attention to Italy – Spain, two strategic views of Logistics. In this session, the speakers agreed that between Spain and Italy “there must be total complicity to make traffic distribution in Spain change”.
With respect to sea traffic and the strong competitiveness between Spanish and Italian ports, the speakers said that in both countries “beyond the necessary competition between both countries, common policies must be encouraged to ensure that internal demand is attended from the ports themselves. Having achieved this, alliances must be established for the European Union to carry out initiatives for the economies of southern Europe to be attended only by the ports of the Mediterranean”. Likewise, they highlighted the need to fight together to reduce the customs requirements in sea transport and stressed the importance of road transport as a complement to the sea.
Autonomic logistics
The central theme of another of the sessions of the Symposium was logistics in the autonomous communities. This session, with the title Present and Future of Logistics in Spanish Autonomous Communities, was covered by Álvaro Miranda, an expert from the community of Navarre; Nuria López de Guereñu, Minister of Transport and Public Works for the Basque Country; María Encina Álvarez, Minister of Public Works for Castilla-La Mancha; Antonia Concepción Guerra, a representative of the Ministry of Public Works of the community of Madrid; Joaquim Nadal, Minister of Territorial Policy and Public Works of the Generalitat, Government of Catalonia; and Concepción Gutiérrez del Castillo, Minister of Public Works and Transports of the Government of Andalusia.
In the discussion, the speakers stressed the importance of intermodality and pointed to the need to support the transport and logistics sector to enhance the regional and national economy. They also coincided in highlighting the need to “improve the railway network with mixed traffic, giving priority to consolidating the high speed train”. Finally, they noted the importance of improving co-ordination between communities.
RFID and the projection of Spanish companies
The two remaining sessions of the Symposium focused on the possibilities offered by RFID and the projection of Spanish logistics in the European Union. In the first, Current situation and views of RFID in Spain. Possible applications, the speakers, including Michael Brandemburg, Vice-Chairman of Capgemini España, Jordi Campabadal, General Manager of Intermec España, Fernando Roldán, Projects Manager of the Zaragoza Logistics Centre, Jesús Molina, Innovation Director of El Corte Inglés, and Joan Carles Agustí, RFID Product Manager of Sun Microsystems, all indicated that the current situation of RFID in Spain is one of slight backwardness “due to the lack of companies working with this system”, although they indicated that this delay is easy to make up, above all thanks to the recent liberalisation of the frequency band. The speakers also underlined the time saved by using RFID and the many possibilities offered by this system in applications related to information management.
With respect to the session intended for discussing the projection of Spanish logistics companies in the European Union, the participants in the round table highlighted the need to improve the organisation of Spanish companies to achieve the necessary productive competitiveness to make the leap to Europe, “the great subject pending of Spanish companies”. The talkers believed that “only with excellence will companies be capable of advancing and being competitive in Europe”.
This year’s edition of the International Symposium SIL- Cinco Días was participated in by over one hundred companies, and a numerous representation of professionals of the sector, which pointed to the importance of this event within the framework of the International Logistics and Material Handling Exhibition.
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(Fonte de informação: silbcn.com)
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