GPCA Celebrating a decade of ANNUAL excellence REPORT 2016 Networking Thought leadership Advocacy Members250 60 when started CONTENTS Chairman’s foreward 5 Message from the Secretary General 6 About GPCA 8 » Profile » Mission Board of Directors 9 Membership growth 10 Arabian Gulf industry: Year in review 12 GPCA: Year in review » Effective networking 17 » Thought leadership 29 » Advocacy 30 * Our youth 31 * Our environment 32 * Our industry 33 Looking forward 36 The GPCA secretariat team 37 Membership listing 38 GPCA ANNUAL REPORT 2016 3 Chairman’s foreward The year 2016 marked a decade since GPCA was founded. Building on achievements from the past 10 years, the association continued to excel in networking, thought leadership and its position Yousef Al-Benyan on the world map, growing into a key regional Chairman GPCA and Vice organization with global scope and reach. This Chairman and CEO, SABIC was reflected in the overwhelming success of key programs and initiatives such as Gulf SQAS, Responsible Care, Waste Free Environment, and as of late – Leaders of Tomorrow, a brand new talent development program, which was launched during last year’s Annual GPCA Forum. Now in its 11th edition, the forum continues to gain in popularity and reputation. It started as a modest gathering in Dubai in 2006, and has now transformed into a truly global event attracting thousands of delegates from different parts of the world every year. This does not only reflect the rising level of interest in the downstream sector in the region, but also the important role that GPCA plays as a port of call for global industry leaders. Throughout 2016 GPCA’s events, workshops and conferences covered key industry topics ranging from the role of technology in running a successful business, to the importance of talent development, innovation and sustainability, and how to turn challenges into opportunities in the current market environment. At the end of 2016, we published a total of 130 publications divided into five different categories, namely, statistical, periodical, post-event, industry trends and co-branded reports. Our publications continued to reflect GPCA’s growing role as the voice of the industry, and the region’s single, most trusted source for data, market trends, research and analysis. Moving forward, GPCA will continue to serve the interests of the industry and add value to its members through its advocacy, thought leadership and networking pillars. The petrochemical industry is what’s been holding the GCC strong during the difficult times, and GPCA will have a vital role to play in safeguarding its place as the cornerstone of our economies. It will depend on us as industry leaders and members of the association, to be proactive and act together. Opportunities are running high to not only shape the future, but define the direction it will take for the next decade to come. GPCA ANNUAL REPORT 2016 5 Message from the Secretary Dr. Abdulwahab Al-Sadoun General Secretary General, GPCA Last year may stay in the minds of many as a year full of challenges, continuous expansion of GPCA’s activities and insourcing but it was precisely because of these challenges that so much more operational aspects of our various events. was achieved. Never before have we seen such great level of cooperation, leadership, and forward planning, demonstrating the Networking industry’s genuine desire to improve and reach new heights. Here in GPCA celebrated its 10th anniversary on the night prior to our the GCC, we know all too well that true success is shared success, 2016 Annual General Meeting (AGM) when we looked back to and whatever each and every one of us achieves is for the benefit our first decade of achievements. The occasion brought together of the region as a whole. From the creation of more employment veteran industry leaders who shared many inside stories behind the opportunities for our highly valued youth, to supporting economic evolution of the chemical sector in the Arabian Gulf and its journey to diversification and making meaningful contributions to society, our becoming the global hub it is today. industry is on track to become the main driving force behind growth and prosperity in this region. We kicked off the year with the 7th GPCA PlastiCon, followed by the 3rd GPCA Research and Innovation Summit, the 8th edition of our Membership Supply Chain Conference, 7th GPCA Fertilizer Convention, and 3rd Since its inception in 2006, GPCA membership has grown 9% on GPCA Sustainability Conference. a compounded annual basis. Starting with just 60 members in the first year of operations, today we partner with 250 companies We concluded our 2016 portfolio of events with another successful of which 35 are full members and 215 are associate members. Annual GPCA Forum, which was attended by a total of 2,005 This year alone we were joined by 26 new members from around delegates. Throughout the year, GPCA hosted three workshops the Middle East and the world including one full member – Oman including the GPCA Renewable Energy and Waste Management Methanol Company. Without doubt, our continued membership Workshop, GPCA Product Stewardship Workshop, and a seminar growth is a reflection of the important role GPCA plays in providing assessing the impact of methanol on the global energy market. the right platform for doing business in the region, and the increasing In total, 3,276 delegates attended our nine events and stand-alone preeminence of the Arabian Gulf as a global chemical production workshops, in addition to five seminars and four workshops which hub. took place as part of our conferences. I would like to take this opportunity to express my sincere appreciation to those individuals Administration and organizations who have actively supported us by either sending Moving on to our latest new appointments, Yousef Al-Benyan, a significant number of delegates, or by becoming a sponsor. CEO and Vice Chairman of SABIC, assumed the role of Chairman in May 2016, taking over from Rashed Saud Al Shamsi, former Thought Leadership Petrochemicals Director at ADNOC. We offer Mr. Al Shamsi our GPCA’s role as the ‘Voice of the Industry’ was reinforced through sincere appreciation and gratitude for his valued contributions to the a series of new reports and studies published throughout the year association and for steering it into a direction of continued growth and made available for download on the GPCA website. This year and success. we released a total of 16 publications co-branded with McKinsey and Company, KPMG-Strategy, Nexant, Integer and Sustainability Special thanks are due to our outgoing board members Asaad Excellence. We recently released the new editions of ‘Connecting the Al-Saad, CEO of PIC, Khalifa Al-Sowaidi, Vice Chairman and CEO Gulf’ members directory and ‘2015 Facts and Figures’ for the GCC of QAFCO and Musab Al Mahruqi, former CEO of Orpic, who also petrochemical and chemical industry which includes summaries in served as chairman of the GPCA International Trade Committee. both English and Arabic language. We are also pleased to welcome the new members of the board: Abdulrahman Al-Suwaidi, CEO of QAFCO, Ahmed Omar Abdulla, GPCA continues to provide thought provoking articles, industry CEO of Borouge, Ahmed Saleh Al Jahdhami, CEO of Orpic and news and comprehensive market analysis through GPCA’s Insight last but not least, Mohammad Al-Farhoud, CEO of PIC. Mutlaq and Insight Express newsletters, as well as improve our regional Al-Morished accepted the chairmanship of the International Trade petrochemical database that offers industry forecast and all the Committee replacing Musab Al Mahruqi, and Hamad Rashed information you need to make informed decisions for your business. Al-Nuaimi, CEO of Qatar Vinyl Company (QVC), was appointed Treasurer. As with every year, we aimed to present the growth and achievements of our industry in an innovative and creative way. In The secretariat team has also been growing as a result of the line with the theme of product diversification and adding value, we 6 GPCA ANNUAL REPORT 2016 developed the ‘The Arabian Gulf Petrochemical Value Chain Tree’, 2016 marked another first for GPCA as we launched the inaugural which illustrates the great diversity of ‘Made in the GCC’ products edition of the GPCA Supply Chain Excellence Awards during the 8th and their huge value for the industry and the region at large. GPCA Supply Chain Conference in Dubai. We also hosted the 6th edition of the GPCA Plastics Excellence Awards which attracted Advocacy 51 submissions across six categories, including dedicated student 2016 marked a number of milestones for GPCA’s advocacy, chief award. among which was the launch of Leaders of Tomorrow. The initiative is facilitated and sponsored by GPCA member companies and is As part of our global advocacy agenda, we participated in a number designed to provide university and college students with background of international meetings and conferences, sharing our industry’s in STEM-related subjects an opportunity to build industry knowledge position and best practices on matters such as effective waste through participation at GPCA events and close interaction with management. Amongst these were the Asian Plastics Forum’s industry leaders. The first edition of this initiative was launched during Conference held in Thailand, the 27th Global Plastics Alliance meeting the 11th Annual Forum and sponsored by Dow. in Vietnam and the World Plastics Council General Assembly in Germany. We also saw our Waste Free Environment (WFE) campaign extend its global reach into Europe and Asia, with events taking place Going forward, we will be looking to publish the Arabic version of in China as well as Singapore. For the fourth year in a row we Molecules, Mind and Matter, which narrates how the Arabian Gulf witnessed growth in both plastic waste collection and participation.