The SIAL Food Business Exhibition is preparing to go ahead in October this year, despite the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
Organisers of the five-day event, which is scheduled to take place in Paris, say they remain: “Resolutely optimistic and mobilised to offer our companies the export springboard they so badly need to rekindle their business.”
Announcing the news, general director of the SIAL Network, Nicolas Trentesaux, said: “Coming at the end of six months of quiet business, SIAL Paris will constitute, perhaps more significantly than ever, the major global event for the industry from the 18th to 22nd October 2020: as a catalyst for business and an acknowledged melting pot for worldwide innovations, SIAL Paris will kick off the recovery of food exports all over the world.
“We are carefully preparing a range of different ‘public health’ scenarios so as to be able to welcome everyone in the safest conditions. The measures implemented will naturally comply with official rules and are likely to evolve according to circumstances. Numerous measures are being studied, some more technical and linked to the rigorous management of flows, some more visible and directly linked to the implementation of barrier gestures: wearing face masks, systematic hand washing (hand sanitizer), disinfection and ventilation of spaces, badge digitalisation, a temperature-taking gantry.”
Trentesaux continued: “We are also studying special arrangements to organise tastings specific to our sector: individual portions and packaging, slicing on demand, hermetically-sealed dustbins, etc. Finally, access to the exhibition centre (cars, taxis, RER) will be governed by the measures put in place by the Ile-de-France regional authority.”
