IULTCS have posted two questionnaires on their website concerning the round tables they intend holding at the International Leather Forum in Paris on September 17, 2007. The first round table concerns education and training of leather professionals and multiple choice questions are presented, for example, on the subject of tannery experience: should you get a lot more, more, ok as it is, should get less, much less.

Dow have announced price increases for acrylates in all regions. They state that The Dow Chemical Company and their affiliates ('Dow') have announced price increases for acrylic acid and esters ('acrylates') effective June 1, 2007, or as otherwise allowed by individual contract terms.

Introduction

About 60% of Indian tanning occurs in Tamil Nadu where there is a discharge limit for TDS of 2,100mg/l. In 2006 the TDS situation in Tamil Nadu (TN) became even more critical for the tanning industry than it was in 2005.

At Tanning Tech in Bologna Alpe Spak were featuring their Divididora Suprema splitting machine which is available for wet-blue/dry hides. There was a lot of interest shown in the machine which Alpe Spak say is entirely designed with the latest technologies and with high quality materials, with high performance, reliability and strict adherence to the latest health and safety regulations.

Also, requirements may vary around the world: for some 'eco-friendly' footwear is important. All these attributes have to be taken into consideration by retailers, footwear designers and leather manufacturers alike. The consumer's expectations are constantly moving upwards so, if want to make footwear that sells, innovation is crucial. In this article we look at how the leather industry is moving ahead with new and novel ideas for footwear leather.

The problem

Farmers need a method of permanently identifying their cattle. In fact it is compulsory in many countries and branding has been the tradition method of use for centuries. Ear tags are too easily lost and, like tattoos, can only be read at close quarters. Branding provides a quick, cheap and very permanent mark that is easy to read at a distance. But, whilst branding helps the farmer, it certainly does not help the leather which is left with scars and grain disfigurement.

This year the fair was bigger and busier than ever before. BASF, who showed for the first time, were so overwhelmed by the mass of visitors that they had to send back to their Indian headquarters for reinforcements. And, despite the expansion of the exhibition complex itself, there was still a sizeable portion of the show under canvas.

This year's LERIG meeting, which took place just before the IILF in Chennai, took Benign Environmental and Sustainable Technologies as its theme. The meeting is organised annually by the Central Leather Research Institute with a full programme of presentations.

During the four-week period ended May 19, 2007, Federally Inspected Slaughter showed an average weekly kill of 677,000, up from the 634,750 of our previous report. This compares with an average of 679,500 in the same period the previous year and represents a 2.5% increase over 2006.

FAO and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) are researching the genes of black Bengal dwarf goats, a key leather livestock in Bangladesh, to improve breeding techniques and the species' health. They are a key and distinctive element of the countries estimated 30 million goat population that produces 20 million sq ft of skins annually.

The hide market dropped further since our last issue. April saw typical weeks where more hides were produced than sold, thus forcing producers to gradually accept lower bids in order to keep their hides moving.

May proved to be almost as difficult for hide traders as April. Tanners complained and moaned about everything from weights to shapes to flay, to fat to dung and finally to a fall in the value of splits.

Up until 2003, TFL supplied the Indian market through a sales agent. Now, however, they decided it was time for TFL to strengthen their position in this promising market with the acquisition of the Indian finishing specialist Quinn and merge them with the overall TFL know-how and infrastructure.

Trumpler International and their Taiwanese agent C H Sam & Co. Ltd., in collaboration with the Taiwan Bulls Golf Association held their second annual golf competition at the Agile Golf and Country Club in Zhongshan City, Guangdong, in March. The event was a huge success with its 68 participants, in terms of the outstanding golf played as well as a social gathering of tanners from Taiwan and China. In addition, through the generosity of the sponsors and players alike a substantial sum of money was raised which was donated to a well deserving children's charity.

At a recent ceremony in Campinas Brazil, Steve Buckman, CEO of Buckman Laboratories International, presented the Edward Weiss Memorial Award to Telmo Seganfredo. The Edward Weiss merit award is given annually in recognition of individual excellence for contributions in the fields of research, applications technology, marketing or technical support and sales.

Stephen Braude, president of Braude Brothers Tanning Corp, Woburn, USA, from 1954-1985, died on May 3, 2007, in Palm Beach, Florida.

Shanghai Richina Leather Co Ltd have announced the appointment of Neil Perrin to be the general manager for bovine production, reporting to Roger Wang, office of CEO, effective March 19, 2007. Neil brings with him a wealth of experience in the leather industry; he spent 16 years with Pittards in the UK, and ten years with Prime Asia and Prime Tanning.

The Rohm and Haas Company board of directors has elected Brian McPeak a vice-president of Rohm and Haas Company.

Michael Vennard, who joined Clariant just over seven years ago, has decided to take up the opportunity of moving to Thailand to join the agent of Clariant as a partner. In this way he can retain his ties with Clariant while taking up a new challenge ('perhaps my last chance to try something new and challenging. I sincerely wish that Clariant will continue to grow and prosper and be more and more successful in the future').

At LANXESS, Dr Werner Breuers has succeeded Dr Ulrich Koemm on the management board. Dr Breuers takes up his duties on May 14, 2007. At its meeting on May 8, the supervisory board of LANXESS AG agreed to Dr Koemm's request that he leave the company prematurely. Supervisory board chairman Dr Rolf Stomberg comments: 'The supervisory board and management board of LANXESS AG would like to thank Dr Koemm for his enormous contribution to the company's success, and especially for his work to strengthen the businesses for which he was responsible.'

Of course I am not beyond criticism and I invite readers to write and correct me where I am wrong or encourage me where I am presumed right. I would greatly welcome new ideas for Limeblasts.

Danish footwear manufacturers Ecco Sko A/S have reported record results for last year. Aggregate sales including accessories and leather grew 16.7% to e600 million. Net sales earnings in the footwear sector rose 18.9%.

By early May, more than 95% of the exhibiting space for the next edition of Le Cuir A Paris, September 18-21, 2007, being held within Premiere Vision Pluriel, had been reserved. As usual, the Italian presence will be very important, particularly with a pavilion organised by the region of Tuscany (Promozione Economica della Toscana). This pavilion will comprise 18 companies, of which four have never participated in Le Cuir A Paris before: F.lli Nazzi, Conceria Stratos, Conceria Genesis 98 and MPG Cuoificio Spa.

Theo Staikos, Wolfson School of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, Loughborough University, said that currently more than 20 billion pairs of shoes are consumed worldwide every year, and this figure continues to rise. This creates an enormous amount of post-consumer (end-of-life) shoe waste that is currently being disposed in landfill sites around the world; landfill sites which can result in serious environmental pollution and land contamination.

Introductory thoughts

China now produces 40% of the world's leather and over 70% of the world's shoes. India has 20% of the world's livestock that will supply hides to the market to be converted into leather. Neither of these countries is new to manufacturing leather, both have had indigenous production for the home market and in-depth training facilities for future technologists for a long time. Recent changes in leather businesses and manufacturing of leather product have followed the trend of other industries and production and have moved or are moving to China.

This month we are focusing once more on India as the country sets itself an incredible target of 20% annual growth to the year 2010 when it hopes to achieve US$7 billion in leather and related exports against a current projected level of $3 billion and a growth rate for 2006/7 of 9.24%.

There has been much speculation about the volume of Chinese exports in 2006 which has led to the revision of statistics on leather footwear by the Chinese government. While both Chinese imports and exports of leather and leather products have increased overall, exports of leather footwear to the European Union decreased dramatically in the last four months of 2006.

May 19, 2007, was the tenth anniversary of the inauguration of the technical laboratory of LANXESS Wuxi Chemicals Co Ltd in Wuxi, China, 120 km north-west of Shanghai. The company, originally formed as a joint venture with Wuxi Dyestuff Factory, produce and market leather chemicals primarily for the Chinese market. In addition to synthetic and resin based tanning materials, they also manufacture a comprehensive range of other wet end and finishing auxiliaries. The major customer sectors are the automotive, footwear and furniture industries.

The tenth edition of DLTA, the International Fair of Shoes & Leather Industries Materials & Technology and DLFA, the International Fair of Shoes, Apparel & Leather Products is due to be held from August 30-September 2, 2007, in the Damascus Fair Grounds. srayri@scs-net.org

A bright multicoloured dress introduces Stahl's Fashion Colour Forecast poster for autumn and winter 2008/2009. The poster will make a bright show on the wall to cheer-up the work place over the dull winter hours.

According to Ahmad Waseem Tabassum, export executive, Shafi Reso-Chem have introduced an environment friendly, phenol free degreasing agent Evolite 2020. Evolite 2020 is a fatty alcohol based wetting/degreasing agent that smoothly removes extra fats from leather without making it dry. It is a non ionic synergistic, viscous liquid. Evolite 2020 is described as environment affable and biodegradable; it can work at any pH. Evolite 2020 has high wetting power. Its low quantity is effective for more area, it can be diluted easily and is low foaming.

Sudarshan Kumar Mishra, senior technical manager, C & E Ltd, India, highlights the benefits of a finely dispersed casein product that improves the finish of leathers. CTOP-AMC is an alkaline anionic solution of very finely dispersed casein, which yields a highly transparent and medium hard film with a requisite resistance to water. The film yielded by CTOP-AMC gives a mirror like surface and a microscope shows the appearance of tiny mirror-like plane surfaces separated about 0.3mm apart, which is close to the average resolving power of human sight.

Argentina

The last five years have seen a positive cycle in cattle ranching in Argentina. Cattle stock has increased from 50 million to 55 million and slaughter emerged from a decade long stagnation (12-13 million heads per year) to 14-15 million. This was partly due to the four million tons of corn used per year for supplementary bovine feeding.

BASF broke ground for a new plant in Pudong, Shanghai, on March 20, 2007. They already have one auxiliary plant in BASF Auxiliary Chemicals Company (BACC) located at the BASF Pudong site where they are producing chemicals for the whole leather process from beamhouse to finishing. The new plant will have a minimum capacity of 10,000 metric tonnes per year and will produce Basyntan, Relugan and Tamol. The new spray dryer for leather chemicals is the third one at the Pudong site.

In the Cold selection the colours were thin and muted; shades of white through to pale green and grey then onto black. This range is intended to draw attention to shape and form and create a sense of calm relaxation. The cool colours certainly are restful on the eye.

Cromogenia launched the following products at Tanning Tech: