Economic crunch crushes LIA 20th national conference

Citing hard times and the prospect of further deterioration by October the industry’s premier technical body pulls the plug on its Sydney get together.

According to LIA Federal President, Greg Grace, the conference slated for Sydney on the 15 and 16 October 2009 has been deferred. Citing the industry downturn due to the current critical economic situation Grace said, “The major factor influencing the decision, was the severe impact of that crisis, which has resulted in a downturn of activity in the local printing industry. With the prospect of the situation deteriorating further in the coming months, we had to make the hard choice and defer.”

Bob Lamont, the LIA’s NSW Executive Officer, said the decision was the only viable alternative. “Before taking this decision, we looked at every possible option to make it happen, but each model we created told us that the forces stacked against us, made staging a successful conference highly problematical.
“In the end we came to the conclusion that deferring and re evaluating at a time when there would be a clearer picture of the chances of staging a successful future conference was clearly the only way to go.”

“The economic downturn has affected all players in the industry including the supply companies, almost all of whom are heavily committed to the Pacprint show and understandably, some have indicated difficulty in allocating additional dollars to support the LIA in this period of extreme uncertainty.

The LIA will now focus on the staging of the 2008-2009 National Graduates Awards Presentation, which will be celebrated with a Gala Dinner to be held in Sydney on Friday evening 16 October 2009. We are delighted that our major sponsors Heidelberg and GAMAA are committed to supporting this event,” said Lamont