Malta Chamber scaling up efforts for industry to embrace the New Norm

“We are in talks with Government to convey industry operators’ feedback on the re-engineering and transformation scheme, to build further on its sound basis and align it more to their needs.”

Malta Chamber President Marisa Xuereb stated this during an Enterprise Europe Network event within an innovative digital learning and networking platform launched by Malta Chamber, focused on aligning manufacturing and retail businesses to the requirements of a New Norm. 

The platform is aimed to help operators restructure their operations, optimise the use of technology and business operations by bringing them in contact with service providers and facilitate their preposition to penetrate international markets during one-to-one business meetings.

Close to 200 business representatives from over 20 countries have so far registered in the virtual platform set up by The Malta Chamber last February.  

Xuereb, explained the thought process behind the learning and engagement platform.  She stated why the Malta Chamber has endeavoured to invest towards making best use of digital tools to continue providing value to its members during the pandemic, emphasising that the manufacturing industry needs to be clear towards where it is heading, by starting small but thinking big. 

“The first ambition, which the Malta Chamber has clearly outlined in its Economic Vision towards 2025, is that of achieving smart economic growth within the sector.  Through this learning and engagement platform we are responsibly showcasing what a company within the industry can do to achieve its ambitions within a New Norm.  Essentially, we want the industry to embrace initatives and implement actions to design and build operating models around innovation and technological capabilities.  We want our businesses to become knowledge-based enterprises, competing with cutting edge value-added manufacturing and reinventing service sectors such as retail and tourism”.

Xuereb, a manufacturing operator herself, explained that even though our local industry proved to be resilient during the pandemic it is still a long way from reaping the full benefits of Industrial Internet of Things.  She therefore underlined the importance of reacting to market changes faster and more efficiently by allowing adjustments to production capacity.

Xuereb also acknowledged that the manufacturing industry, like the country, is in a race against time to achieve herd immunity against COVID-19 through vaccination. She explained that while remote working has provided many employers and employees with new possibilities, there are many jobs that do not lend themselves to remote working. In this spirit, she repeated the call made last week towards prioritising the vaccination of employees who cannot work from home.

“Initiatives such as workplace vaccination centres would make it easier for employees to get vaccinated and company doctors could assist in administering vaccines to get more people vaccinated within a short time frame. Such strategies would contribute to a more effective roll-out as workplaces have been consistently the second most common source of contagion after household contacts.”