The Port of Tarragona and ChemMed participate in the annual EPCA meeting and the Argus conference in Berlin

The Port delegation met with various petrochemical companies and logistics operators

They presented their projects for the extension of the Chemicals Wharf, the ZAL, the La Boella intermodal terminal and the Puerto-Centro terminal, among others

The president of the Port of Tarragona and ChemMed Tarragona, Josep Maria Cruset, and the Port’s Marketing and Business Development Director and director of ChemMed, Genoveva Climent, headed the Port of Tarragona’s delegation at the annual meeting of the European Petrochemicals Association (EPCA) of which the Port is a member. The international meeting was held in Berlin from 6 to 9 October.

The Port of Tarragona also took part in the Argus Olefins & Aromatics Conference, European Seminar, that was held in the same European city and of which the Port and ChemMed were sponsors. At both events, those delegates spoken to by the Port of Tarragona’s representatives valued very positively the Port as a key gateway to the European continent via the Mediterranean. Some thirty meetings were held with companies in the sector and agents who had declared an interest in the Port and the chemical industry cluster, as well as the territory and the south of Europe as a whole.

The EPCA is the main European business network for the global petrochemical business community. It offers members from all over the world the opportunity to meet industry leaders and external interested parties and to stay up to date with developments on the international market, as well as the worldwide technological and social trends. This year’s annual meeting was attended by more than 700 chemical manufacturing companies and nearly 2,500 delegates from 54 countries all over the world. The EPCA also helps its members in specific matters to support the sustainable development of the petrochemical industry. This year the event’s theme focused on the petrochemical industry and the low carbon economy, in order to seek solutions for improved sustainability. It featured talks by prestige speakers in the field.

The EPCA format is based on B2B meetings with the possibility over the 3 days of arranging bilateral meetings with different production and logistics companies related to the petrochemical sector. This 53rd edition of the annual meeting was a worldwide business event for the chemical business community and brought together all the main agents in the sector.

International projection

In Berlin, the Port of Tarragona and ChemMed, continuing their strategy of gaining international projection, held meetings with diverse logistics and, above all, industrial operators They presented the projects they are developing, such as the extension of the Chemicals Wharf, the ZAL, the La Boella intermodal terminal and the future Puerto-Centro terminal, as well as the ChemMed cluster. They emphasised Tarragona’s possibilities for receiving new investments in the petrochemical sector.

The Port of Tarragona delegation took advantage of the event to position the Port’s activities as a regional hub for the storage and distribution of chemical products in the Mediterranean area, as well as to highlight the Port of Tarragona as a logistics platform for petrochemical products in the Mediterranean. Its aim is to improve the operators’ businesses now that the extension of the terminals has increased storage capacity to such an extent that it allows the diversification of stored products and opens the Port up to new markets. Another objective is to identify possible foreign investors.

Argus Conference

Argus, a well-known consultancy in the petrochemical sector, brings together manufacturers, dealers, distributors and market analysts to discuss trends in supply and demand, the increase in world capacity and worldwide commercial flows. The event took place on Sunday 6 October, also in Berlin, and offered the opportunity to explore the future of the international markets with petrochemical industry analysts.

The objectives of the Port of Tarragona and ChemMed Tarragona at this conference were to communicate and improve the visibility of the cluster on a European level and to promote it as an investment area. They also organised networking actions designed to seek out possible customers and/or potential investors.