Congress heads for Cannes

France's Construction equipment association, CISMA, will be hosting CECE's 2006 Congress over two days in October this year. Around 200 CECE members are expected to travel to the event which will be held at the Hotel Majestic Barrière in Cannes on Thursday 5 and Friday 6 October 2006.

CISMA has condensed the event into two days, rather than the traditional three, to enable more people to attend but has designed a programme to ensure the quality and variety of the event is not affected. The 2006 Congress is split into two parts - the first will give delegates the option to attend a variety of different seminars, discussion groups and workshops while the second will be a general session.

Despite the busy programme, CISMA has said that there will be plenty of time to meet with other delegates during the event. Members of CECE's sister associations from Brazil, Japan, Korea and the US have been invited to the event and there will also be opportunities for meetings with the organisers of CECE-supported events including Bauma, Intermat, Samoter, SMOPYC and ConExpo.

Briefings

The first part of the conference will provide an overview of developments in specific product categories including: road construction equipment; tower cranes; crushing and screening equipment; earth moving equipment and hoists. Speakers with in depth knowledge of each product area have been selected to address the groups, which will provide opportunities for discussion.

The group discussions will be followed by an opening address by CECE president Henri Marchetta. The afternoon sessions of the first day will focus on economic and technical matters.

The technical discussions will include an update on the latest developments in European legislation such as the exhaust emissions regulations and the future of the Noise Directive. During the session the Technical Commission will present a workshop which will look at the implications of the new Machinery Directive.

European and non-European markets for construction equipment will be analysed by economic specialists in the other afternoon session. The introduction to the afternoon will be made by a yet to be named speaker from macro economic agency Rexecode, who will share their vision and strategy for the successful future and development of the construction equipment industry.

The economic analysis will also include a presentation from construction forecasting group Euroconstruct on the evolution of the European market. David Phillips, managing director of Off-Highway Research, will also present his views on the rental market in Europe.

The Future

The second part of the event will bring delegates together to take a look at three topics with an overall theme of the future for the construction equipment market and its customers.

The first session is entitled the ‘Voice of our Customers' and will include presentations from Eurovia equipment and investment manager Michel Ducasse and Loxam director general Gérard Deprez. Mr Ducasse is expected to discuss the type of machines which end users will need in the future, while Mr Deprez will analyse the machines and services currently demanded by rental companies and how that is likely to change.

The ‘Voice of our Industry' is the focus of the second session and JCB group engineering director Tim Leverton will discuss evolution and technologies. Wacker's chief executive officer Georg Sick will take a look at homologation, harmonisation and the simplification of EU regulations.

The topic of the final session will be ‘Our World and its Evolution'. The speakers for this part of the event have not yet been finalised but the talks are expected to cover geopolitics and company strategies and will be followed by a presentation entitled ‘The Generations: a vital human resource challenge'.

The afternoon session will finish with a presentation from a surprise guest speaker. CISMA's organising committee has not revealed his name but has said that he is a well known and celebrated adventurer who will talk about his experience of achieving his goals in a challenging and ever changing world. The official part of the Congress will be concluded with a gala dinner at the Hotel Majestic Barrière.            ce