Fruit Attraction is adapting its format in order to continue stimulating international trade relations
Fruit Attraction 2020, co-celebrating from 20 to 22 October with Flower & Garden Attraction and with the new Fresh Food Logistics project, which offers solutions for the entire cold chain, continues with the organization and planning of its 12th year. The trade fair will incorporate new elements into its format with the aim of serving as a fulcrum to promote the reconstruction of international trade relations within the fruit and vegetable sector. It takes place in October, which is the key time for the sector. The confidence of the sector as a whole, and the support of the international Fruit Attraction community to speed up the recovery, has allowed the fair to have recorded an increase of 5% in registrations for participation, compared to the same dates last year.
“We have a responsibility to celebrate Fruit Attraction 2020 together. I am sure that when it closes its doors on 22 October, all the heads of the participating companies will be proud to have contributed to the reconstruction of international trade relations for the entire fruit and vegetable sector value chain. During these months of COVID-19, our agri-food sector has shown and will continue to show the community as a whole all its strengths, reaffirming itself as a strategic and fundamental sector for our social structure’s food supply and confidence”, says fair director, Raúl Calleja.
Jorge Brotons, president of Fepex and the Organising Committee for Fruit Attraction, adds that “we continue to work towards October, in a scenario of a return to certain normality, because we need to see each other’s faces and work to help companies continue selling and growing. Fruit Attraction will be a great tribute to and recognition of all the professionals in the fruit and vegetable sector who have been working intensively in the field, in maintaining supplies, in the factories, in logistics, in distribution, in marketing, in warehouses, and at the points of sale around the world during these months of confinement and uncertainty”.
IFEMA and the Community of Madrid have agreed to dismantle in May the Emergency Hospital that its facilities are currently hosting, as will happen with the resource made available to the homeless. This will allow the maintenance projects and investments scheduled for the summer months to be carried out, ensuring the infrastructure is in optimal condition to resume activity in September.
The new provisions that IFEMA will implement in the coming months include services such as a thermal solution for measuring body temperature that will be incorporated to help monitor people accessing the site.
Aware of the uncertainty, but in a context of having to generate commercial sourcing and supply opportunities to match international fruit and vegetable supply and demand, accompany companies in the new investment scenario and minimise the risks associated with participating in Fruit Attraction, work is already underway on a new format in which the “functionality and commercial utility intrinsic to the fair” will be enhanced. It will probably be less social in order to preserve attendees’ health and safety (access management and capacity limits, temperature monitoring, hygiene-sanitary measures, etc.). This means moving away from grouping many visitors together and toward an event model that focuses on buying and selling processes and presenting new developments, innovations and know-how for this new market and consumption scenario. Three days during which the industry comes together to generate and develop commercial relationships in a mixed face-to-face and digital format, enhancing the quality of the buyer profile. Three days of international buying and selling, supply agreements, campaign planning, news, face-to-face, and virtual forums and debates, all taking advantage of IFEMA’s 5G technology.
Fruit Attraction will be held at a time when visitors from many countries will be able to attend the event in person and others will participate digitally through a new B2B-eMeeting service (30-45 minute video calls on a platform available for smartphones and laptops), with prearranged or spontaneous agendas between exhibiting companies and buyers from all over the world that are part of the entire Fruit Attraction digital community. This will enable the fair to put forward new value streams for customers who are unable to attend.
The intense specialised programme of congresses, conferences, debates, company presentations, etc. covering the entire value chain will also take place in a mixed format and will begin virtually with the “VIRTUAL FRUIT FORUM” on 14 October, for the entire