BIR World Recycling Convention & Exhibition in Berlin (29 May – 1 June 2016)

Plastics Committee:

ALBA and Panalpina guest speakers give expert insight into their respective fields of competence

The BIR Plastics Committee, under the chairmanship of Surendra Patawari Borad, has prepared an interesting programme with the invitation of two guest speakers for their plenary session in Berlin, which will take place on Wednesday, 1 June 2016 at 10.30.

Stephan Schwarz of ALBA Group (DEU) will give a presentation on “Opportunities and challenges in plastics recycling”.

Mr Schwarz joined the ALBA Group in 2011 and overtook the responsibility of the international trading business in paper and plastics. At the end of 2015 he was appointed MD of Alba Electronics Recycling – the WEEE business of the group and was invited to join the board of the WEEE-JV in Hong Kong, where ALBA Group is building up an e-waste processing unit together with IWS and the Hong Kong EPD. Being head of the Business Unit Plastics and E-Waste he is reporting directly to the owners of the company. The ALBA Group has with its two brands – ALBA and Interseroh – about 200 subsidiaries and equity holdings within Germany, Europe, the US and Asia. With an annual turnover of approx. 2.9 billion Euros (2012) and about 9,000 employees, ALBA Group is one of the leading recycling and environmental services companies as well as raw material providers worldwide.

Second speaker will be Thorsten Diephaus of Panalpina Welttransport Deutschland GmbH (DEU) who will highlight “The role of logistics in the recycling business”.

Mr Diephaus has more than 20 years’ experience in shipping and logistics working with carriers and global forwarders. He studied International Transport Management in Germany and started his career at one of the Top 5 global logistics providers.

In the last 10 years he was responsible for ocean freight development on regional and country level, especially for exports of recyclables and forestry products. Since 2012 he is in charge of ocean freight exports for secondary materials and forestry products at Panalpina Germany. His department takes care of FCL ‘door-to-port’ solutions from all over Germany and BENELUX  to worldwide destinations, incl. documentation and customs processes. Panalpina Welttransport Deutschland is part of Swiss-based Panalpina, provider of forwarding and logistics services, specializing in intercontinental air and ocean freight and associated supply chain management solutions. It operates a network of some 500 branches in more than 80 countries; in a further 80 countries, the group cooperates closely with selected partners. Panalpina employs some 15,000 people worldwide