E.C.E.D. General Assembly in Bonn 24-25 October 2002

According to its annual tradition, E.C.E.D., the European Confederation of Equipment Distributors, holds its general members' assembly in fall to discuss current action points.

This year, the main issue was the opening of the confederation to associations or federations that group rental companies (short or long term) on the national level.

The rental business is already present in the associations of the current members either because many dealers have an individual rental department or because the core rental companies are somehow represented in the affiliated national federations.

ECED would like to open up officially to interest groups that gather rental businesses. Based upon the philosophy that customers deserve the best service and that the need for rental modalities is increasing in a number of E.U. states, E.C.E.D. wish to provide this activity within the branch with a platform where its interests will be defended.

In the next few months, it is our aim to encourage the concerned associations to join E.C.E.D. and to place the issue of the rental activity as a steady topic on the agenda in the light of INTERMAT, to take place in May 2003.

We also placed the opening to associations from the countries that will join the E.U. in 2004 among our action points.

Finally Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany and Sweden decided to start a database of stolen machinery through the website.

For any information about members and the Board of E.C.E.D please consult www.eced-association.org

People to contact: Leo Lubbers (President) Philippe Decrock (Secretary General) Tel. +32-2-778.62.00 E-mail: sigma@federauto.be