The Conference Center in Wroclaw, Poland, was the venue for the fourth running of ConExPest an event organised by the Polish pest control association and held on 11 and 12 May 2017.
Held only every three years, this was the first time this Polish trade event had been held in the historic town of Wroclaw in western Poland. The event itself was housed in Centennial Hall designed by the famous urban architect Max Berg in 1911-1913, when the city was part of the German Empire. It was also listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2006.
Visitors unanimously agreed that the city of Wroclaw with many buildings dating back to the Middle Ages. On the middle night of the exhibition, a gala dinner was held at the nearby zoo. As Kieran Wyatt from Russell IPM explained: “It was a first time for me in Poland and my opinion of the country is that it is beautiful. Wroclaw is very spread out with large areas and everything is so open yet compact and convenient within the centre.”
 Centennial Hall – the venue for ConExPest |
 Wroclaw – old town hall in the market square |
Within the exhibition nearly 50 exhibitors had stands. The companies present ranged from the usual international suspects, such as Bayer, Bell, BASF etc to a clutch of more local Polish companies. As ever, exhibitors from the UK were well represented by familiar organisations such as Pest West, Russell IPM and International Pest Control. Making debut appearances were Simpson Turner, Yanco and Octavius Hunt (see Pest feature Issue 49: February & March 2017) .
 Paul Sidebottom in full flow on the Russell IPM stand |
 Companies from the Polish market were well represented |
Overall, most of the exhibitors felt that ConExPest 2017 attracted more quality foreign visitors from well known companies than its predecessors, but not on such a large scale as events such as PestEx, Parasitec or Disinfestando. As is often the case, the second day was much quieter.
 First time exhibitors – Octavius Hunt |
 Their full range of products on display at Bá¡bolna Bio |
Summarising their views, Nick Dale of Bristol-based Octavius Hunt said: “Having not exhibited at ConEx Pest before we found it was a great opportunity to meet with our current and potential customers from Eastern Europe. We were pleasantly surprised to also have visitors to our stand from markets outside Eastern Europe and we are busy following up leads from a successful show.”
Although they did not have quite so far to travel from Hungary, Bá¡bolna Bio, displayed their range of patented rodenticides, larvicides and insecticides based on S-methoprene as well as holding a series of business meetings and also supporting their Polish distributor, Themar.
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 Just as at PestEx. Bá¡bolna Bio held their shooting competition on their stand – prizes being discount vouchers reclaimable from their distributor, Themar |
As to be expected there was also a selection of Italian companies present which included Bleu Line and Spray Team supporting Monagro, their distributor in Poland.
In the round. Bleu Line and Spray Team support their Polish distrbutor, Monagro
Within the exhibition, a competition was organised to vote for the most innovative exhibition stand as well as the best rodenticide and insecticide product.The best stand award went to the Muzeum DDD (Disinfection, Disinfestation and Deratisation) from Warsaw. The museum collects historical items and documents relating to the history of pest control and they certainly had a comphrensive display of items on the stand – as seen below!
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Topical seminars
As is the way with such exhibitions, it was supported by a series of topical seminars. These included Adam B?ochowiak, provincial inspector for plant protection and seed production in Wroc?aw who discussed the safe use of phosphine. The problems of rats and insects in and around hospitals was addressed which included one paper from Dr Eng. Marcin Kadeja from Wroclaw University.
Predictably, the topic of CEPA Certified and EN 16636 was explained by Michel Tulkens of CEPA along with Tadeusz Wojciechowski, president of the Polish pest control association.
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Pest would like to thank Bleu Line, Bá¡bolna Bio, Russell IPM and Octavius Hunt for the supply of these ConExPest photographs.
