Cleanzine: your weekly cleaning and hygiene industry newsletter 9th May 2012 Issue no. 519
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 International News
Products SCA strengthens its presence in South America In a press release issued yesterday, it was announced that SCA is to acquire the remaining 50% in the Chilean hygiene company PISA (Papeles Industriales S.A.), and will after the transaction own 100% of the company. The purchase price is approximately 520 MSEK. |
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Welcome to the second issue of the ISSA/Interclean Amsterdam Daily from Cleanzine. Despite the rain (a first in my many trips to this lovely city!) the show got off to a very good start with queues at the entrance points as usual, with what seemed like hundreds of visitors keen to make their way around the halls before they became too busy. We joined them before heading off to the Innovation Awards ceremony, having already seen a number of new products that we would consider innovative. Clearly this is going to be some show! I have to say that the awards ceremony was very slick; there was plenty to keep us interested before the shortlisted companies' innovations were beamed up on the screens, with their respective teams enthusiastically talking us through what the products did and what made them so special. It seemed that any one of them could have been a winner. However... Yours,
   This Week's News
The jury explained that it felt that the Mag system brings an entirely new way of attaching mop covers to the mop holder. In an industry that is evolutionary rather than revolutionary, it was felt that the Mag system represents what appears to be a fairly simple step forward for an everyday tool. Its ease of use, hygienic touch-free operation, flexibility, intuitiveness and ergonomy all impressed the panel. And the fact that the Mag holder can be used with different mop types makes it a practical solution for today’s result-orientated cleaning operations – offering the best mop for each job in a practical and trouble-free way.
Sustainability was a key consideration for almost all of the entries. Chairman of the Amsterdam Innovation Award, Michelle Marshall, said that from all the 71 entries they saw this year, it was clear that manufacturers are really thinking more carefully about the solutions they develop in terms of how they fulfil their customers’ needs – with more ability to tailor solutions for example. "It’s encouraging to note the increasing use of web-based solutions, which until now the cleaning sector has been largely slow to adopt," she said. "Sustainability has been a key consideration for almost all of the new product entries we have seen in this year’s awards. This reflects how deeply these values have become embedded in the industry as a whole." Category winner - Machines, accessories and components:
Other features such as automatic tank filling and rinsing, eco-efficient operation and the tool carrying accessories make this a practical, easy-to-use machine. The judges felt Karcher has introduced some apparently simple features which have in fact been very thoroughly thought-out and show a real understanding of how the machine operators work day-to-day. Category winner – Cleaning Management and Training Solutions
Independent hygienists carry out inspections using the IPM app on an iPad, then provide a full report along with advice as to how performance can be improved. The system goes well beyond hygiene and cleaning – it also covers the handling of patients, wound care, the state of the building, medication and food handling. It is module based so users can decide which areas should be measured, and to what extent.
For the first time, the visitors had a chance to vote for their favourite nominee. They selected category winner Alpheios with its IPM as winner of this year’s competition. Amsterdam Innovation Award supports African water project The Amsterdam Innovation Award supports the African Medical & Research Foundation (AMREF) Flying Doctors. All the registration fees received from exhibitors, which amounted this year to € 10,650, is being donated to the AMREF project in Kajiado, Kenya. The project aims to provide accessible water and sanitary facilities for the community and the AMREF representative said that this money would allow for the needs of about 500 people to be met.
One of the highlights of the awards ceremony was the presentation made by Prof. Dr. Michael Braungart. We thought 2010’s keynote speaker couldn’t be equalled but here again, we were held enthralled as we were surprised with new facts and figures and given lots to think about. For example, he said that recent studies have shown up 60 – 80 different cleaning chemicals in breastmilk, and that there are 40 times more plastics in some areas of the Pacific Ocean than there is plankton. Scary eh? I didn’t quite catch the volume of heavy metals in water – much of which comes from cleaning chemicals - but it was even scarier. But it wasn’t just about the shock factor. He had some useful suggestions too. He said that we as an industry need to provide eco-effectiveness as opposed to eco-efficiency; he also suggested that we should sell the service but keep the materials… that this way, we could supply for a fixed period an expensive, top-of-the-range floor cleaning machine to a country/company that could afford to buy it, then when that period is up, replace it with another top-notch machine but instead of scrapping the original, offer it to a country/company that could not afford to buy new. Sustainability, he pointed out, is simply not good enough – we have to go further than that. And rather than trying to be a little less bad, we should be striving to be beneficial. “We’re designing cradle-to-cradle products but are contaminating them with cleaning products. Why?” he asked. He said that in the Netherlands, for example, breathing fine dust takes on average, five years off the average person’s life. “Why should our lungs do the cleaning for us?” he asked. “We should be developing cleaning products that hold the dust on the surface and clean the air, so it can’t reach our lungs. We should be making surface treatments rather than cleaning products.” He also said that we should look at being pro-microbial, rather than anti-microbial. “Why make products that kill 95% of the good microbes, just to get to the bad 5%,” he asked. He has a point. He also said that we as customers should not pay a higher price for innovation, as we’re providing a platform for that innovation. Interesting that but it’s one point I’d disagree with him on. Someone has to pay for the R & D…
"The secret behind this system’s outstanding results is mechanical cleaning with billions of microscopic diamonds and pure clean water,” explained Andrew. “Twister can be used on any type of floor with no need to change cleaning method or cleaning machine equipment. This, combined with the elimination of periodic maintenance and the long lifespan of the Twister pads, cuts both cost and cleaning time."
Proandre is a Spanish firm with international presence, dedicated to the production and istribution of hygiene systems for the washroom and accessories for the pest control business.
Disposables UK holds the licence to manufacture and sell Wausaupaper’s Bay West range of washroom dispensing systems in the UK and Europe. Wednesday 9th May Cleaning in the 21st Century - ISSA Educational Seminar Keynote speaker Professor Didier Pittet, Programme director of the Infection Control Programme and World Health Organization will focus on the impact that cleaning can have on the risk and spread of infection - in particular addressing global hand hygiene initiatives Dutch National MiniCongress: Clean = Healthy The Cleanzine Archive Search We keep an extensive archive of news stories and product information that have featured in past issues of The Cleanzine. If you would like to run a search of the The Cleanzine web site using the search tool below please just go ahead by entering in the name of the person, product or company or any other key words that you are looking for. How to contact us at The Cleanzine:
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