Update on technologies, prizes, training, associative marketing … The latest Atif initiatives announced during the annual meeting of the Flexographic Italian Association, by President Marco Gambardella.
New initiatives for the training of specialized professionals, with the creation of the Atif Academy, and the “tweaks” to the program of the two highlight events of the year – the gala evening in which BestInFlexo of the year is awarded (21 November 2019) and the subsequent Flexo Day update on technologies and processes (22 November). The goal is to facilitate the ever increasing participation of operators coming from all over Italy, eliminating down times and better distributing the “weight” of the talks, with an unprecedented round of interventions planned also in the afternoon preceding the prize (we here refer to the Bologna event: Flexo Day Sud will take place a few months later, in Salerno). To support the promotion and participation in the two days, the Linkedin page of the association has been recently inaugurated and with the publication of the first videos (part of a full series) that document the content and success of the various initiatives, with the help of testimonials from the companies.
But of course there is much more. Atif is completing new “guidelines” dedicated to the crucial components and steps of flexographic printing (those dedicated to flexographic matrices and double-sided tapes are closed and now it is the turn of sleeves) and actively supporting crucial initiatives such as the Matespack master in “sustainable materials and technologies for polymeric and cellulosic packaging” of the University of Salerno, and the “factory workshop” pilot project to identify training needs, with company training days to be held at a converter located in the center of Italy (after Polipack and Cartotecnica Postumia).
These were the main new features announced by Marco Gambardella, the current Italian technical flexographic association President, during the public part of the 2019 annual assembly, after the regular review of the general economic situation, both national and global, as well as the trends of the converting industry. He then talked about the intense activity of exchange and sharing of studies and experiences with the European and global flexo institutions, the monitoring of the urgent and stringent issues of the “plastic strategy”, the activity of the Atif Technology Center at the Ripamonti Technical Institute of Como, where the machine installed is working at ever greater rates for training courses, tests and trials as well as for focuses on the characteristics of specific work proceedings.
A training Academy
Atif has conceived it as a hub for linking institutions, regulatory bodies, universities and of course companies, involved in various capacities in training programs for qualified professionals for flexographic printing. The task of the Atif Academy is therefore to monitor existing projects (regional, national and European) and to channel resources into the sector. This will create new opportunities allowing companies, especially the smaller ones, to access these tools, thus alleviating any organizational and financial burden on their behalf.
