The Society of Plastics Engineers and the Canadian Plastics Industry Association have signed an agreement forging stronger ties between the two groups.
Brookfield, Conn.-based SPE and CPIA in Toronto announced the memorandum of understanding earlier this year. SPE officials discussed it during Antec 2002 in San Francisco. The agreement represents the highest level of cooperation between the two groups.
The agreement was signed earlier this year by SPE Executive Director Michael Cappelletti and Pierre Dubois, president and chief executive officer of CPIA.
``Our goal has been to take full advantage of the globalization phenomenon that has been sweeping North America and to convert that into business for our respective members,'' Dubois said. ``Our respective memberships have global interests and they are entitled to the added value that would ultimately result from a coordinated approach to trans-border-association affairs.''
Cappelletti said the two groups ``want to advance the prosperity of the North American plastics industry by using our mutual organizational resources in a collaborative manner to promote the human resource development of this industry.''
The memorandum provides for an infrastructure to SPE in Canada through the offices of CPIA, free access and license-for-use to each organization or each other's public documents, a willingness to promote and publicize the other's events through their respective publications, coordination of events and technical seminars, and the linking of Web sites and electronic capabilities.