For eight straight days visitors at the leading textile machinery event will have an opportunity to appreciate the high level of technology being proposed by the 454 Italian machinery manufacturers exhibiting at the fair. The overall exhibition space occupied by Italian machinery manufacturers constitutes 30% of the total surface area, confirming Italy’s leadership position among exhibiting countries.

“We’re justly proud to have brought back to Milan the world’s major textile machinery fair after twenty years,” commented Raffaella Carabelli, President of ACIMIT, the Association of Italian Textile Machinery Manufacturers. “These numbers not only rank Italy first among exhibiting countries, but are a true testament to the vitality of our sector, and confirm the good state of health of the Italian textile industry.”

Commitment to sustainability

For some time now, Italian machinery manufacturers have been focusing on the issue of sustainability for their products, in order to satisfy the demand for efficient technology solutions that effectively cut back on consumption, and consequently on production costs. “Our association has been committed to the issues of environmental and economic sustainability since 2010, with the Sustainable Technologies project, to which over 40 companies have adhered,” explained ACIMIT’s president.

“During ITMA, we’ll be presenting to the specialised press the project’s effects on CO₂ emissions,” said Carabelli. Based on estimates elaborated by the engineering firm D’Appolonia, in 2014 the reduction of CO₂ emissions generated by the use of environmentally green certified Italian machinery in accordance with the Sustainable Technologies project amounted to 221,181 tonnes of CO₂, equivalent to the emissions of 38,534 cars travelling on average 35,000 kilometres per year.

After the press conference presenting these finding, a sustainable fashion show will take place. Five young designers will provide an interpretation of sustainable fabrics supplied by six textile manufacturers with a strong commitment to environmentally responsible policies and make use of Italian machinery. These companies are Besani, Canepa, Ditta Giovanni Lanfranchi, Eurojersey, Italdenim and Tessitura Attilio Imperiali.

Support

The fashion show is part of ITMA’s Special Project set up by the Italian government, through the Italian Ministry for Economic Development and the Italian Trade Agency, with the aim of promoting Italy’s participation in the event.

“ITMA Milan is a unique window of opportunity for the Italian textile machinery sector, which is one of Italy’s industrial sectors with the greatest attitude towards internationalisation. This why it has benefitted from significant financial support from the Italian Ministry for Economic Development, and in partnership with ACIMIT, has been the object of an articulated project known as the Special Project for ITMA Milan 2015, providing support through targeted initiatives to the numerous Italian companies present at the fair," explained Roberto Luongo, General Director of the Italian Trade Agency.

Among the various initiatives that stand out for 2015 are the foreign delegations arriving in Italy: around 200 textile operators hailing from about 10 different countries, including Bangladesh, Iran, Egypt and Pakistan, and the ITMA 2015 Awards, thanks to which 10 students from foreign universities will be able to visit the ITMA pavilions and discover the Italian textile machinery sector’s latest and most innovative proposals.

www.acimit.it