FOI president, prime minister visit InterProgetti

Through the collaboration of the Malta Federation of Industry, Prime Minister Eddie Fenech Adami and Economic Services Minister Professor Josef Bonnici continued their official visits to FOI member manufacturing companies with a visit to two of the three plants of InterProgetti, a new joint venture between the three largest furniture manufacturers on the island, Joinwell Limited, C. Fino & Sons and F.X. Borg Limited.

FOI president Joe Zammit Tabona accompanied the official delegation during this visit.

Dr Fenech Adami said he admired the way these firms had co-operated with each other to penetrate the international market and commended the firms on turning the challenges ahead into new opportunities.

The objectives of InterProgetti were described to be mainly aimed at rationalising the production base with regard to contract work and to make determined efforts to enter the contract export market.

The main spur for the venture was the impending liberalisation of the domestic and contract furniture market, where levies are to be fully removed by January 2003.

InterProgetti was set up late last year and immediately won two very large contracts, the Corinthia Tripoli Hotel in Libya and the Intercontinental Hotel in Malta.

Apart from carrying out the work on these two contracts and also the contract of the new general hospital in Tal-Qroqq, the venture is now seeking export contract markets and has engaged an export manager in Italy.

Malta seminar on working conditions in Europe

F.O.I. director general Edwin Calleja was one of the speakers at a seminar held by the European Foundation on 'Working Conditions in Europe'.

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Social Policy Lawrence Gonzi also spoke at the seminar together with other speakers from employers' and employees' organisations. The proceedings were chaired by Ray Bodin, director of the foundation.

Dr Robert Tufigno, chairman of the Employment and Training Corporation (ETC), closed the seminar. During this half-day event, a presentation was made by a representative of the foundation of the results of a survey on working conditions in candidate countries and in the European Union.

In his address at the seminar the FOI representative pointed out that the federation was not against improvements in working conditions. He appealed to Government and the unions to consider the economic implications on industry of any improvements, which implied additional costs.

Social improvements in general could not be taken out of the economic context, otherwise it will bring disastrous consequences and rather than improving working conditions this could lead to loss of jobs.

Mr Calleja also commented on the survey report results obtained on Malta relating to the structure of jobs, gender considerations, the nature of work and physical factors in the workplace.

Consultation meetings with members in the food, beverages and tobacco industry

The F.O.I. organised a consultation meeting on May 23 for the benefit of all its members in the food, beverages and tobacco sectors about the latest developments as a result of general discussions held with Government.

During this meeting, chaired by FOI vice-president Joe Pace, the FOI decided to hold a series of meetings with the operators in the various segments of the agri-food sector prior to drawing up its overall position for submission to Government.

The specialised technical meetings held by the Federation last Wednesday and Thursday included members operating within the following sectors: pork, eggs and poultry meat, milk, pasta, bakery, confectionery, tomato, edible oils and margarines, animal feeds, tobacco, beverages, beers, and wine.

During these meetings, FOI members discussed the current situation of their particular sectors and the position that the Federation should suggest to Government in its negotiations with the EU.

Among the other topics, members discussed issues like compliance costs related to new legislation; marketing assistance; timeframes for levy dismantling; access into EU markets; and other possible measures, including effective anti-dumping measures to protect Maltese manufacturers.

Vienna workshop on Social Dialogue and EMU in candidate countries

Administration manager John B. Scicluna was the FOI representative at a workshop held in Vienna by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions.

The workshop, with the theme 'Social Dialogue and EMU in the Candidate Countries', initiated a discussion on the drawing up of a 'Development Plan' on Economic and Monetary Union and Social Dialogue in the candidate countries.

The workshop was opened by Raymond-Pierre Bodin, director of the foundation, who later in the day left the workshop to lead the foundation's delegation that was visiting Malta on those two days.

The workshop then tackled various areas, including EMU, social dialogue and the Europeanisation of industrial relations, the perspectives of trade unions and employer federations, ILO and the promotion of social dialogue, the vision of the European Parliament, and the experiences of Ireland and Finland.

METCO Export Marketing Award

During a special presentation ceremony held last Wednesday, five winners of the 2001 edition of the METCO Export Marketing Award were announced. Of these five companies, four award winners are FOI member companies:

¤ Consolidated Biscuit Co. Ltd as the Exporter of the Year in the Manufacturing category;

¤ Foster Clark Products Ltd as the Most Consistent Exporter in the Large Company category;

¤ Biochemicals International Ltd as the Most Consistent Exporter in the Small Company category; and

¤ Gutenberg Press Ltd in the New Exporter category.

We congratulate these companies for their achievement, since we believe that this award acknowledges the hard work being dedicated by these companies operating from Malta to broaden their activities in the global marketplace by exporting their products and services.

TVM programmes on industry

Consortiums and subcontracting will be the focus of the next programme in the TV series entitled L-Industrija u Int (Industry and You), which the FOI, with the co-operation of the MDC and assistance of PBS, is broadcasting on TVM every Tuesday at 7.10 p.m. with a repeat on the same channel the following day at 10.30 a.m.

Readers are also advised that the first of two programmes in this series, which will be dedicated to Infrastructure in Malta, will be shown on TVM on Tuesday, June 11. The FOI encourages all readers to watch these very informative programmes.

39th Industry Trends Survey

The findings of the Industry Trends Survey for the first half of 2002 show that the forecasts of the mainly export-oriented firms participating in the survey are practically all less positive or more negative than those that had been registered for the second half of 2001.

Business optimism, export order books, local order books, and capital expenditure on land and building are all more negative, while capital expenditure on plant and machinery, and production volume are both less positive.

Finally, costs are envisaged to increase at a faster pace than prices, and profitability is forecast to experience a sharp deterioration.

As regards the mainly locally oriented firms the situation cannot be said to be good, but in many cases the forecasts are less negative than those of the preceding six months. Business optimism, export order books, local order books, and capital expenditure on land and building are all less negative.

Production volumes are up, while capital expenditure on plant and machinery is down. As in the case of the mainly export-oriented sector, firms are expecting a sharp increase in costs that will be only partly compensated by a small increase in prices.

However, profitability forecasts tend to point towards a slightly less negative situation than before.

It is clear that manufacturing industry in Malta is still suffering from a depressed demand situation that has been a common characteristic in several of its main export markets. Industry has been doing its utmost to increase its productivity and reduce production costs.

But these firms are operating in a difficult environment and only the more competitive will stand a chance to improve their performance while the uncompetitive ones will find great difficulties to survive.

International competitiveness in products and services is the best indicator to measure the chances of survival or otherwise of our producers of goods and services, and, ultimately, of the Maltese economy in general.

A recent EU report (Report on macroeconomic and financial sector stability developments in candidate countries - April 2002) had this to state on Malta: "Maintaining external competitiveness will be crucial for the coming years to reduce potential risks. In this regard, it will be fundamental to maintain wage growth moderation and to continue with structural reforms to increase the competitiveness of the Maltese economy."

The FOI has long been aware of the fact that many of the changes Malta is introducing in the social, environmental and other fields to upgrade its economy and standard of living of its citizens will involve industry in additional costs.

This is why, in order to offset these costs, the FOI has been campaigning for several years for a reduction in government-induced costs. These would include all those goods and services which, through government legislation or administrative action, such as the setting up or sanctioning of cartels or monopolies, have a cost for the end user that is unreasonably high when compared to that of our competitors.

In the FOI's opinion, it is now even more important than ever for the social partners to put competitiveness as the most important factor in all their actions. Unfortunately, while everyone pays lip service to competitiveness, not everyone is prepared to act accordingly.

One might highlight two examples. Was competitiveness Government's most important consideration when it decided to leave out of the Bill on the Employment and Industrial Relations Act most of the recommendations made by the FOI and the other employer organisations intended to minimise costs?

Was competitiveness the topmost consideration of those trade unionists who ordered strike action over the past few months over issues that did not seem to warrant the ultimate industrial action?

It is important for one and all to start turning words into deeds.

Readers wishing to obtain a copy of this Industry Trends Survey are to contact the FOI Secretariat on tel: 2122-2074 or 2123-4428 or on e-mail: info@foi.org.mt.