Control Union Sri Lanka launches new corporate identity

Fizel Jabir

International inspection and certification giant Control Union unveiled its new logo simultaneously with the annual client party and fellowship of Control Unions Inspections(Pvt)Ltd held at Cinnamon Grand Colombo on Friday.

The event created an opening for top management of plantations, food-processing industries, wood based industries, exporters, textile industries agriculture industries as well as government institutions and universities.

Along with the launching of new corporate identity of Control Union starting from July 1, 2013, the new logo of Control Union was also unveiled to the gathering at the event.

Dirk Teichert, Chairman- Asia Region of Control Union, Sanjaya K Pathirage, Control Union Managing Director Sri Lanka and top officials also participated in the launch and fellowship.

Control Union Inspections (Pvt) Limited, a member of Control Union presents a wide range of programmes in agriculture, food, feed, forest products, textiles and bio energy which are managed in a more decentralized way, with accreditations that reduce dependency on any one authoritative body. Control Union offers a global one-stop-shop for a wide range of certification programmes which are accepted by authorities in nearly every country.

By understanding the importance of impartiality and objectivity, and how to professionally manage conflicts of interest, sustainability has been the main focus of its certification services from the beginning. Key programme issues were food safety, sustainability, recycling, footprint and social aspects.

Speaking to Daily News Business Dirk Teichert said, the reason for introducing the new logo was to fuse the two trade names Peterson and Control Union and show that it was one entity. He said the old logo was 10 years old and there was a feeling of being not timely anymore and required to reflect the globalization of the company and highlight that it was that they have grown from being a European, South American and Asian company to one that now covers Africa and basically the entire world.

Teichert said they cover 60 countries directly and the balance with contractors. He said they have a staff of over 3,000 worldwide and Sri Lanka plays a big role in their Asia set up where a lot of activities are centralized in Sri Lanka covering Vietnam, Cambodia, Myanmar, Korea and Japan. So the Sri Lankan set up was not only catering to the Sri Lankan market but supporting the region as such with programme management and other support activities for the rest of the region.

He said they cover over 200 programmes worldwide which range from food and feed sector, textiles into energy and sustainability in general and as a company they were not only confined to inspections and certifications, but also involved in logistics.

Teichert said they also had a collaboration between their Indian office and Sri Lankan office to support the first drilling of oil in Sri Lanka by providing logistical support last year and as a Group they had three co business areas.

Teichert added, "What we are looking in Sri Lanka in particular is to see if we could integrate some of these services into our portfolio in Sri Lanka as well. Right now we are mainly focusing on certifications and inspections but we are also keen in looking into see if we can bring other services in, like again warehousing, logistic services to the clients and of course looking forward and seeing how the oil and gas is going to develop down here to see whether there will be a future for these services in Sri Lanka as well."

Sanjaya K Pathirage, Control Union Managing Director Sri Lanka said,they are seriously looking at basing themselves in the South because the shipments start operating from the southern area. We actually have plans to work in the inspection and the collateral side there and we would be working with banks in funding the investors whoever wants to export and import things in and out of the country.