Event programme to offer great value and networking for label industry professionals.

Labelexpo Americas returns to the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont, Illinois in September, with early bird tickets now available.

In one month's time, we will address critical issues facing the European label community, such as supply management, labelstock, consumer habits, regulations, workforce, big data, and many more at the FINAT European Label Forum 2022 from 1-3 June in Baveno, Italy. Registrations are coming in, make sure you are also amongst them. As a warm-up, FINAT will host two pre-event webinars, free available to all FINAT members.

CELAB-Europe announced the release of an interactive map on their website today which is going to list collectors and recyclers of used liner and matrix materials that are a part of the production of labels used on packaging.

Following the message to the Belgian cabinet taskforce of March 31, FINAT has now also approached the EU Commission to inform them of the supply chain distortions that have been aggravated due to the continued strike at UPM Paper Mills in Finland.

Following a news article in a Belgian newspaper on supply chain problems in the agrofood sector that was brought to our attention, FINAT has sent a letter to the Belgian cabinet taskforce on Agrofood Supply (consisting of the Belgian Ministers for Economic Affairs and for Agriculture as well as the State Secretary for Consumer Protection) to appeal for a European approach to the current supply chain distortions and in particular the paper shortage. We publish this as an open letter to policy makers.

Label Academy, the global training provider for the label and package printing industry, is to host a virtual master class tackling Industry 4.0, in April and May.

In 2021, European self-adhesive labelstock demand increased by another 7% to almost 8.5 billion square meters, after an increase of 4.3% in 2020. Underlying these growth numbers were completely opposite fundamentals. Whereas in 2020, excessive demand for self-adhesive labels was driven by the need for labels in essential sectors like food, personal care, medical and pharmaceutical products, demand peaked again in the second and third quarters of 2021 due to the unexpected strong economic recovery around Europe. However, after emerging general supply chain disruptions since last summer, the fortunes of the label industry have turned dramatically since the beginning of 2022 by long-lasting union strikes in a specialty paper mill in Finland and recently, another supplier in Spain.

The majority of products on the market have one or more adhesive labels.

If we recap back to 2020, undoubtedly a lot of things have changed. We are talking not only about COVID's direct consequences, but also the indirect ones. And on top of that, many trends already existed, but the disease has promoted or speeded up the process.