Annual Meeting 2008back

Annual Meeting of Wholesale Market Managers

14-19 September 2008

Bucharest – Poiana Brasov

Romania

“AGRO-TRENDS 2008”





Bucharest Wholesale Market S.A. hosted the CEI WMF members during the Foundation annual workshops in Romania on 14-19 September 2008.



The Foundation members had an opportunity to visit the Bucharest Wholesale Market and the Mihaesti Assembly Market. Representatives from all the member markets described new developments in their markets as well as development policies and strategies. Agro-trends for Central and Eastern Europe in 2008 were presented based on examples from Poland, Romania and Hungary.



Effective management of a wholesale market was discussed by all the participants as a continuation of the Foundation work on the best practices for wholesale markets, which will result in a best practice guide to be published in autumn 2009.



A newly designed Foundation website was presented by the Foundation Secretary General.



Representatives of the Horticultural Promotion in Kosovo Project, taking part in the Foundation meetings, presented the current situation and future development plans of the agricultural sector in Kosovo.



The Foundation plenary meeting focused on the following issues:

 Election of a new Chairman of the Programme Council – Ms. Mihaela Prodeus, a long-term member of the Bucharest WM Management;



 Interest expressed by representatives of the Horticultural Promotion in Kosovo Project i.e. Mr. Sylvain Roy and Mr. Luan Hoti (InterCooperation), as well as Mr. Roland Larashi from GreenMarket Albania to become members in the Foundation in 2009,



 Action plan for 2009 – it was decided that one of the annual workshops in 2009 will take place in a non-member country, i.e. Spain, Madrid and Barcelona WMs, 19-23 April, 2009;



 Need to change the Foundation Statute was unanimously expressed; a proposal for a new Statute will be presented during the spring meeting in 2009;



 The new website of the Foundation will be used as a platform for a better promotion of the Foundation and its mission. Since a new price monitoring functionality has been added, the website will be an effective tool for exchanging trade and marketing information between all the Foundation members and the external world. It was proposed to add a Forum and an automatic price benchmarking table to provide a user-friendly tool for comparison of current prices from the Foundation member markets. It was decided that price reporting would start as of 1 October 2008 with a group of fruits and vegetables selected during these workshops by the Foundation members as the most representative for all the markets.



As a part of a cultural program, the Foundation members had an opportunity to visit the Palace of Parliament, the Count Dracula’s Castle and the Sinaia Royal Castle.