After the corona pandemic and the supply chain crisis, the signs at the beginning of last year were of hope for a fundamental recovery and easing of the situation. With Russia's invasion of Ukraine, things proved to be different. Momentarily, the uncertainties of the overall economic development driven by inflation and geo-economic questions could hardly be greater. For the European foundry industry, the question of energy availability at competitive prices is top of a long list. In these challenging times, Milko Milanov, who looks back on several decades of experience in the foundry industry starts his CAEF presidency. Graduate engineer Milko Milanov spends his whole life in the foundry industry, having started as a mould maker and later becoming manager in the largest foundries in Bulgaria. Today, he runs a jobbing foundry as well as a training and consulting centre for the Bulgarian metal foundry sector. With his calm and reflective manner, the Bulgarian entrepreneur succeeds Chiara Danieli in rotation. The CAEF General Secretariat would like to express its sincere gratitude for the extraordinary commitment of Chiara Danieli over the past year. She has taken important initiatives to increase CAEF's impact in the long term. CAEF is pleased that Chiara Danieli will continue to represent the French foundries in the CAEF Council and thus will remain an important cornerstone for the association. At the same time, Secretary General Fynn-Willem Lohe welcomes Milko Milanov at the top of the association and looks forward to further good cooperation.
Background information on CAEF:
CAEF is the umbrella organisation of the national European foundry associations. The organisation, founded in 1953, has 22 European member states and works to promote the economical, technical, legal and social interests of the European foundry industry. At the same time, CAEF implements activities which aim at developing national foundry industries and co-ordinating their shared international interests. The General Secretariat is situated in Düsseldorf since 1997.
CAEF represents 4 400 European foundries. Nearly 260 000 employees are generating a turnover of 39 billion Euro. European foundries are recruiting 20 000 workers and engineers per year. The main customer industries are e.g. the automotive, the general engineering and the building industries as well as the electrical engineering industry. No industrial sector exists without using casted components.
