Meed, the business information specialist and organiser of premier conferences and networking events, will be holding the Gulf Logistics Forum 2008.

The event will be held from March 24 to 26, 2008, at the Shangri-La Hotel, Dubai. It will focus specifically on major projects and investment opportunities in the logistics sector, one of the region’s fastest moving industries.

With the global freight market set to reach $1.4 trillion by 2020, and the Gulf imports and exports reaching $320million at the end of last year, cities across the region are actively competing for a share of the spoils.

The Gulf nations are all actively developing their logistics capacity across air, sea and land.  The industry benefits from the region’s key geographic location between European and Asian markets – and is supported by its own fast developing infrastructures and burgeoning business centres.

This has led to high market growth; but the challenges of skills shortages, customs and tariffs, and imbalances between inbound and outbound trade flows remain and will continue to make an impact on the industry.

CEO, Dubai Logistics City (DLC), Michael Proffitt will make the event’s keynote presentation on Dubai’s potential as the world’s logistics and business hub of the future.

“Supply chains affect almost every aspect of a business and a significant failure within the supply chain can have a devastating financial impact on a business,” said Proffitt.

“Therefore companies should introduce supply chain management as an integral element of their board meetings. Unfortunately this is still not the case for many companies and, as a result, the supply chain/logistics teams do not have the necessary support within the company. DLC provides a perfect platform for companies to profitably leverage their supply chains."

Meed is the acknowledged market-leader in key regional industry-focused events and conferences; delivering expert, up-to-date business intelligence, industry data and research findings.  – TradeArabia News Service