the European logo for the marble industry launched by the European Federation, EUROROC, for the marble companies of the Old Continent, an industry with an output of over 33 million tons.
Carrara, October 2005
Guaranteeing consumers of the authenticity of natural stone products made by European companies is by now a need, recognised by both companies and consumers, especially in Europe, where the European Federation of European Marble Industries (Euroroc) has recently registered the European logo to mark out natural stone materials, a logo whose Italian variant is “Pietra Autentica”.
This initiative involves all the people working in the quarrying, processing and sale of stone, and professor Gerd Merke, secretary general of Euroroc, met the president and CEO of Internazionale Marmi e Macchine, Giancarlo Tonini and Paris Mazzanti, to present the new mark and discuss the possible implementation of joint initiatives to make it adopted by producers and to make it known to consumers.
“IMM, as a company dealing with the promotion and improvement of marble and all stones – stated president Tonini –, will give its greatest support to the promotion of a mark that should protect both producers and end users, and we are willing to organise, during CarraraMarmotec 2006, initiatives and promotional events in support of a mark that concerns European products and producers, who, in the EU countries alone, quarry as much as 33,585,910 tons of marble and granite, a very substantial amount compared with the over 89 million tons that account for the world’s annual output. Committing ourselves to protecting producers and consumers in such a huge market as the EU, which comes first in the quality and quantity of natural stone they use and is an essential model for all the world with its completeness and the quality of its products, is a duty, which falls within our institutional tasks and which we are most willing to fulfil as we know we will be assisted by Euroroc and Assomarmomacchine, the relevant European Federation and Italian Association, respectively, which are deeply involved in this activity”.
The logo will distinguish the European marble companies, and the Italian companies can use the Italian version “Pietra Autentica”. The European logo will actually have the same graphic image for all of the 25 member states, with the translation of the words, underneath, into their national languages attesting to the natural and national origin of the stone.
“Pietra Autentica” is run and distributed in Italy by Assomarmomacchine, the only Italian member of Euroroc.
To support the logo and make it known, IMM has included it in all the information materials produced and distributed to promote CarraraMarmotec 2006, and it should be also included in the proceedings of the international “Marble Architectural Awards” which in 2006 will be given to European designers. A promotional campaign by Euroroc targeted to the press has also been planned for the next Carraramarmotec (www.carraramarmotec.com ).
