Mahmood Daylami, General Secretary of the Gulf Aluminium Council (GAC), talks FACE

Mahmood Daylami, General Secretary of the Gulf Aluminium Council (GAC), the major organization representing the aluminium industry in the Gulf countries, was interviewed on November 10th by ArtValley. The interview touched upon a number of themes, including FACE.

Q. In your opinion, is FACE , the Federation of Aluminium Consumers in Europe, functioning as this voice?

A. Yes, I think that FACE is a good organization, they are active, they represent downstream businesses, and they have had successes, now circumstances have changed and it is necessary however there should be change in approach than before to produce different results. What that approach should be, I should leave that to FACE to decide. FACE can be much more powerful, much more dynamic, much bigger, but it needs support. It needs support from the industry, from Europe. And it’s not the money; it’s getting the people to contribute and support their activities for the benefit of the European Aluminium industry, especially the downstream and the consumers. FACE represents the consumers of aluminium in Europe, and it’s for them to convince the policy makers that the downstream side is at a disadvantage. These are the fact. At the moment the EU aluminium primary producers have the upper hand because they have controlling role in the European associations and it is possible that they direct what to be done. I think the downstream should take more action, have more of a voice within the European associations to bring about that change.
My personal opinion is that there is not enough voice coming from downstream, not strong enough to tell the policymakers that the industry is sinking. If you put the number of the EU downstream aluminium people, whether it’s the number of employees or the number of companies, they represent the largest portion of Aluminium industry in Europe.
The point is that they are scattered, they are small-medium businesses, they are private and family owned and they do not have dedicated people in the big organizations to do this job. The SME can’t afford to do the same thing as the big producers that have a dedicated department just to do the lobbying for them and public relations. The small companies can’t afford that, that’s where the weakness is. The only way they can do it is by being together and they are not as necessary.

Read the full story here.