Dear EPTDA members,

In these desperate moments of facing a global pandemic together, and after much reflections, observations and conversations with our members – we have taken the sad but essential decision to postpone the EPTDA 2020 Annual Business Convention in Warsaw.

Thank you for your response to the survey and helping us to make this tough decision unanimously and collaboratively.

The new dates of our ABC 2021 will be communicated as soon as we have some clarity on the ongoing restrictions.

Over these past few weeks, we’ve all borne witness to how this unforgiving virus is impacting our families, our communities, our very way of life and our industry. As part of a global family and global business leaders, we must stick together. As your association of trust, we have gathered all forces to ensure that we stay connected to our members – digitally and personally. We have stepped up our efforts on communication, by sharing best practices from around the world on how CEOs are responding to the dramatic impact of COVID-19 on business. We have also elaborated on our quarterly Market Insights reports to feature free webinars, EU Monitoring and research from ITR Economics and Oxford Economics on supply chain, manufacturing and distribution.

We highly recommend that you take the time to review our continued special coverage on COVID-19 from the EMEA region. If you need us to open access to our Members Only section for other members of your team, please do send us a note with names and email addresses, at [email protected].

Please stay connected to our social media channels LinkedIn and Twitter for regular updates and best practice examples from our own and related industries. Do share the examples of your initiatives to fight COVID-19 with us, so we can inspire other members by sharing your stories on social media.

We are aware that our members need guidance, strategy and leadership on where and how the EPTDA will continue to add value to their membership in absence of having the annual opportunity to meet together face-to-face. We will continue to capture opportunities to bring knowledge, data and information to you, as it happens – and creative ways to bring our members together online. We are setting up a special task force with key members of our Board of Directors, Past Presidents and Volunteer Leaders to craft a Plan B to bring our members together through digital channels.

If you have a suggestion on how else we can support you, please do let us know.

Let these extraordinary times serve as a powerful beacon of hope and belief that there is an end to this pandemic, and that we will all rise again to a new future. The entire EPTDA community joins its hands in distance, in wishing its members and friends, patience, courage and wisdom in these difficult times.

Let’s all stay informed and help each other by sharing knowledge and best practices, until we meet again in happier times.

Sincerely yours,

Hans Hanegreefs | EPTDA’s Executive Vice President