Mike Boswell elected as new BPF President

Mike Boswell, the Managing Director of Plastribution Ltd, has been elected as the new President of the British Plastics Federation (BPF) at the organisation's AGM. He succeeds Philip Watkins who has held the post since 2011.

A BPF veteran, Mike has been a longstanding Chairman of the BPF's Polymer Distributors and Compounders Group and has served both on the BPF's Council and Strategy and Finance Committee. He has a broadly based experience of the industry and the Federation. He joined Plastribution as a Technical Sales Representative in 1988 and progressed up the ladder to his current position, becoming Managing Director in 2000. 

He said: “I am both delighted and honoured to be elected to the Presidency of such a vital organisation for the UK plastics industry.The BPF has an extremely strong reputation nationally and internationally and I will be striving to ensure that plastics manufacturing in the UK will have an even more effective voice in the future and that the BPF's work continues to be of direct benefit to its rapidly growing membership.”

At its AGM the BPF also published a 'Progress Report' on the discussions and actions arising from President Watkins's strategic paper - 'The UK Plastics Industry: A Strategic Manufacturing Sector'. Paying tribute to Philip Watkins's initiative, Mike Boswell added: “We are immensely grateful to Philip for establishing a solid strategic platform for the industry. The Discussion Paper was unique in stating the case for plastics materials and products and the wider UK plastics industry itself.

“At the next council meeting I will be making clear my presidential theme,” Mr Boswell told BP&R after the AGM. “I am certainly hoping to build upon a lot of the key aspects Philip has raised, brought forward and highlighted.”

The Progress Report documents the status of the key 'Messages for Government' laid out in the original Discussion document, essentially problems holding back the industry's development which Government could help fix.