Italprogetti, whose core business is the tanning division, has been ahead of its time: in the past decade it has heavily invested in the field of ecology and in the design and construction of low environmental impact plants
It has been a winning strategy that has been in place for some years now by Italprogetti, based in San Romano (Pisa province) and founded in 1977, whose core business is the tanning division: by virtue of technical and engineering skills, the massive investments in research and the experience gained over time, have enabled the Tuscan industry to establish itself as a leader in Italy and worldwide. President Mario Serrini, whom we interviewed during the show, made an overview of the market, at a time when the economy is not easy due to several factors.
“Today a lot is being invested in sustainability,” explains President Serrini, “we have been doing this for many years. At the Linea Pelle exhibition (concurrent with Tanning Tech, ed.), in another stand, again under the Italprogetti brand, together with the software company, we presented an experimental drum for calculating carbon dioxide consumption related to each tannery process. It is an advanced machine, and we are convinced that it will have good success because it can assess the environmental impact precisely. We are working a lot on the tannery and the purification sector; the aim is to be able to decrease the environmental impact and energy consumption. All the most famous fashion houses are investing in this area, and we are able to respond to the requests that are made.”
“As the years go by,” observes Engineer Serrini, “regulations on the subject are becoming more and more stringent: environmental impacts must be reduced and consumption reduced. To this situation, which has been expected for years, we must now add the cost of energy, which has risen uncontrollably, to the point of forcing every company to find alternative solutions to avoid the risk of accounts in debt. We in this sense are favoured by the fact that we have been forward thinking, our policy of reducing consumption on machines has been active for some time, somehow, we have managed to get ahead of the times and be prepared. In a global view we can say that before it was a good thing, now it has become indispensable, the risk of going out of business is real. However, in order to achieve good results, it is essential to introduce automated plants that comply with the directions of the 4.0 industrial plan.”
“The results of the Fair,” concludes ITALPROGETTI’s president, “were substantially positive, there was a good turnout overall, especially on the central day, but this is now a normal occurrence for this fair. As we expected, especially because of the health pandemic, there was a lack of operators from China, but instead from the East we were surprised by a good presence of those who arrived from Hong Kong, we can say that they have become the “new Chinese.” It was also known that there would be a lack of Russian operators and this has precisely happened, here of course weighing in is the war conflict in Ukraine. As is now clear the world markets are suffering from extra-economic aspects, the hope is that in 2023 the various issues will recede, at least in part, so that we can return to a calmer and more favourable situation. However, making a prediction is impossible: the world has always moved forward, but having to simultaneously deal with the events of a war in Europe, a shortage of raw materials and a high rise in inflation makes it very difficult to make predictions.”
Mario Serrini