Chinaplas 2010 Post Show Report

The Show Must Go On – a Post Show report on Chinaplas 2010

Chinaplas is the largest International Plastics and Rubber trade fair in China, second largest show in the world and growing in strenght year by year. The event attracted nearly 82,000 visitors with 18% of them from overseas.

The BPF organised a British Pavilion at the show with the following 10 UK exhibitors:Ashe Converting Equipment

• Aerogen Company Ltd
• British Plastics Federation
• Chemical Week
• MSA Engineering Systems Ltd
• Meech Static Eliminators Ltd
• Nextool (UK) Ltd
• Rapra Ltd
• Simba Plastics Ltd
• Zotefoams Plc
  

  Despite being hampered by flight cancellations, the BPF co-ordinated British Group at Chinaplas reported considerable success.  The visitor rate was very high and is set to break all records and exceed well over 75,000, with 52,908 attending in the first two days.  Despite the severe travel restrictions, over 20% of all visitors were from outside of China. 

  By the first day of the show (Monday 19th of April), in spite of the flight problems, all ten UK exhibitors had arranged representatives to man their stands mostly with Chinese agents.  However Richard Walton of Rapra Ltd, Chris Francis of Meech Static Control, Ash Shah of Simba Plastics and Gary Jones of MSA Engineering Solutions, manned their stands personally.

  Chris Francis reported that the first day of the show was 'incredibly busy for Meech' and he took 115 sales leads on the first day.  Richard Walton reported that over the course of the first two days, over 300 Chinese companies expressed interest in Rapra Membership.

  The BPF itself, including President Paul Jukes, was badly hit by the cancellations and were unable to attend the fair.  However they arranged for posters and literature to be printed in Shanghai and by day three nearly 1000 copies of the British Group Guide and the Mission Guide had been distributed from the BPF stand by locally hired representatives, ensuring the British exhibitors were widely promoted at the fair.
  

  A 17 strong outward Mission led by Rapra Ltd had been arranged, with an evening reception, a half day seminar and even a visit to the Shanghai Grand Prix.  In Shanghai Rapra's Richard Walton successfully co-ordinated a technical seminar attended by 60 Chinese including representatives of the China Plastics Processing Industry Association (CPPIA), Shanghai SAM (Society of Advanced Materials), Shanghai Plastics Training Institute and the Shanghai Plastics Engineering Society.  From their London offices, the BPF was able to work with Rapra to re-jig the programme so that presentations were given by  Keith Freegard of Axion Recycling, Richard Walton of Rapra , Ash Shah of Simba Plastics and Mr. Ma Zhan Feng, General Secretary of the CPPIA.

  The evening reception still went ahead, with a high profile Chinese guests being greeted by a presentation from Peter Wickenden, UKTI Head of Trade (Shanghai), who promoted the upcoming UK Advanced Engineering Showcase set to take place in Shanghai 23-24 June to coincide with the World Expo Shanghai (for more information see www.ukaechina.com).  A number of British Exhibitors faced the prospect of being stranded in Shanghai, one being told the first available flight was 7th May (some 17 days after he was set to fly back!) and another managed to secure a route home via the States.