italian made shoes

A.N.C.I. is The National Association of Italian made shoes Manufacturers - groups together Italian footwear manufacturers. Approximately 1,000 industrial enterprises belong to the Association. The turnover produced by the member companies represents approximately 70% of the overall Italian footwear production. The purpose of A.N.C.I. is to examine, support and promote projects of an economical, technical and scientific nature in the interest of the made shoes industry and to represent the same on all institutional levels. The association is particularly dedicated to promoting the Italian made shoes category on the most important foreign markets in order to ensure the good image and the presence of Italian footwear which is renown for its creativity, style, original design and precision workmanship of an artisan nature, as well as for the use of carefully selected materials. A.N.C.I. is also the association's own services company through which it organises the MICAM Shoevent, the leading world-wide footwear exhibition. For the Italian made shoes sector, 2003 ended with very negative results, leading Rossano Soldini, President of the Association of the industrialists in the sector to speak of "deep gloom". And 2004 is been only slightly more positive. In 2003, in fact, exports of Made in Italy shoes showed a decrease of 7 percent in quantity and 6.2 percent in value (282 million pairs exported compared with 303 million the year before). However, some first signs of recovery in the Italian made shoes sector have now arisen. The occasion was provided by Micam, the main European trade fair for shoes, held at the Milan Fair in Italy. The outcome of the event, in fact, has been extremely positive, up to the point that a significant change in trend can now be discerned for the second semester of 2004, indicating a clear recovery in exports. The aims of Micam fair is to make Italian footwear well known and increase the made shoes distribution by promoting, organising and taking part in trade fairs, exhibitions and industrial and commercial conventions both in Italy and in foreign countries, and by encouraging and facilitating the participation of member companies in these event. With more than 33 thousand visitors, Micam, in fact, ended by registering a global 5,05% increase compared with September 2003. The increasingly international character of the event is reflected by the significant increase visitors coming from abroad (more than 14 thousand, equal to almost half the total), registering an increase of 17 percent compared with the preceding year. In particular, the strong presence of Japanese clients has afforded great hope, and points to a significant recovery in the Japanese market, while the presence of French, German, English and Spanish clients was also established. Excellent signals have come from Russia, a country where there is a growing demand for Italian made shoes , and also the American market is beginning to show revived interest. Yet the home market is still facing problems. Italian participation, in fact, recorded a fall of roughly 2 percent in the number of visitors. "This result - says the president of the Association of Italian Shoemakers, Rossano Soldini, "represents an important statistic within this cycle of business trends in Italy that is not positive. Micam has been established as the main date on the calendar in the sector at the international level and a reliable indicator of the mood of firms. In Italy a made shoes showroom in growth, in a phase as problematic as the one we are experiencing now, denotes an injection of trust for the whole sector".