This 5 and 6 December 2013, the first Wallonia Export-Invest Fair took place at the Palais des Congrès in Liège.
Jointly organised by AWEX and the French company, Classe Export (Lyon), the objective of this event was to bring together in one place as many providers as possible of services that are useful to exporting companies wishing to go international.
For the first event of its type, this can be judged a great success: almost 80 exhibitors from the public and private sectors, as many activities in terms of seminars and workshops, more than 1,300 visiting companies and over 2,000 personalised and programmed contacts. Six foreign delegations were also present. The majority were, from the start of the week, participants in the first Halal Week organised by the AWEX cell in charge of raising the awareness of Walloon companies to opportunities in the Muslim economy.
AWEX was well represented at WEIF with a stand of almost 150 m², and the presence of 109 economic and commercial attachés from 12 countries (more than 300 contacts with companies).
Among the highlights of the event were several seminars organised by the management of the financial incentives, the presentation of the first labels to citizen exporting companies, the awarding of diplomas to 70 trainees of the Explort programme, a major symposium on country risks in 2014 (held by the CREDENDO Group, ex-Ducroire), language training workshops, inter-clustering meetings, a TIC awareness platform and a space dedicated to transport and logistics. The event was concluded with a forum dedicated to foreign investment in Wallonia.
The venue is already booked for next year.
