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NAVIGATING INTO TOMORROW NOW IN HIS SECOND YEAR AS CHAIR OF EPCA’S SUPPLY CHAIN PROGRAMME COMMITTEE, DIRK VERSTRAETEN PROVIDES AN UPDATE ON PROGRESS ON THREE FRONTS
When he took over the chairmanship of the
post-pandemic world? The session ‘Standing
supply chain. But that journey into the sunlit
EPCA Supply Chain Programme Committee,
Strong, Moving Fast’ on the second day of
uplands of a cleaner, greener logistics sector
Dirk Verstraeten, director of global logistics
the Annual Meeting will look beyond the ‘new
has three paths: not just digitisation but also –
procurement at Covestro Deutschland, could
normal' from the supply chain perspective,
and partly enabled by digital technologies –
not have anticipated that his tenure would
investigating new business practices and
ways to address the industry’s contribution
include a pandemic-inspired global lockdown,
trends accelerated by the Covid crisis.
to climate change and to foster the
with rapid and immense changes to chemical
Speakers will aim to analyse, define and
development of a circular economy within the
supply chains around the world. As the European
reframe opportunities to identify the right
petrochemical industry.
industry gathers virtually for this year’s EPCA
way forward to build the logistics and supply
Annual Meeting, there are still questions about
chain of the post-pandemic world.
how the crisis is going to affect the sector in
“Digitisation is with us all the way on this journey,” Verstraeten says. “It’s changing: it’s now becoming part of the corporate strategy
the longer term – and, perhaps more pressingly,
It has been evident from the past few EPCA
for some companies.” But not all, though;
in the near term too.
Annual Meetings that the petrochemical industry
some companies are still thinking about it.
The big question to answer is this: how
and its logistics service provider (LSP) partners
One way in which EPCA is pushing for
can the petrochemical industry contribute to
are on a journey and that that journey centres
a wider digitisation in the sector is to open
building a smarter, circular and more inclusive
very much around the process of digitising the
up space on SCPC for tech companies and
HCB MONTHLY | OCTOBER 2020
