We had the opportunity to talk to Mr.Ya-Ping Zhou, Director (Greater China), of NPES about its activities in the entire region in general and China in particular. Mr.Zhou is the Founder President of a California-based global communications marketing company specializing in market development for the communications industry. He spearheaded the launch of the first true business-to-business dual language website servicing China and international graphic arts industries (www.npes.com.cn).

Print China Daily : Would you please give us a brief introduction of NPES?

Ya-Ping Zhou : NPES is the Association for Suppliers of Printing, Publishing and Converting Technologies. It is a trade association of over 400 companies which manufacture and distribute equipment, systems, software, supplies used in printing, publishing and converting. Our dictum is to set standardization and uniformity for printing industry in America, and have an impact on policy-making of the government, such as the government’s policies on environmental protection, tax and the income of workers. Our main task is to coordinate the relationship between the government and printing industry, which, as we hope, can further the development of printing industry in the USA.

With over 70 years of development, NPES has gone through many ups and downs, such as the Great Depression in 1930s, the financial storm in 1980s and 1990s, the September11, and the financial crisis in 2008. As far as our industry is concerned, NPES plays a leading role in favor of our industry’s management and survival.

Print China Daily : How does politics influence the development of printing industry?

Ya-Ping Zhou : In American political system, there are the House of Senate and the House of Common. When it is necessary to make some changes to the policy on printing industry, the House of Common will consult it with NPES firstly. For example, NPES will give some suggestions on the technology standard, that is, how to set reasonable standard for printing industry technology. The government is also responsible for adjusting national tax policy according to present economic situation and protecting its domestic industry with adopting some protectionist policies. When the government and NPES get together to hold hearings; they always raise questions and then hope to obtain answers from NPES. After a series of marketing analysis, we found that China’s market was of great potential and market-oriented, so our government decided to set up a strategic partnership with China, and we both parties have achieved a lot of successful cooperation. In conclusion, American government’s effort is to more advantages for its enterprises to develop better.

Print China Daily : What position does printing industry hold in American economic fields?

Ya-Ping Zhou : In America, printing industry includes printing products, packaging, manufacturing, import and export etc. All of these, not including newspaper printing, account for 2% of GDP. Because in recent years, the amount of newspaper printing is decreasing, while the number of readers get information from media based on Internet is increasing. It is safe to conclude that there must be some relation between these two phenomena, and that is why we do not take newspaper printing into account when we talk about printing industry. Moreover, we can predict that in the future, this amount, I mean, the percentage of printing industry in GDP, may also decrease, because nowadays mobile media is increasingly being used, such as MP4, E-books, for people to download relevant information, magazine or fictions. But it is worth to note that mobile media is based on the Internet, or else it is useless. It is a trend and some printing products may be replaced by Internet media, however, it needs time and they have their own disadvantage since advertisement cannot be printed on them.

Print China Daily : Almost all the industries have been influenced by global crisis. So do you think it will also influence the manufacturing of printing machine that is produced by considering environmental protection?

Ya-Ping Zhou : In my opinion, there are few printing machines that are truly environmental friendly, because the cost of manufacturing such machine is high and it needs some processing, which means it is almost inevitable to discharge some pollutants. So the true environmental or green printing machine should be processed considering environmental protection. Some enterprises have achieved this from the very beginning of manufacturing such machines. They invest much more money in research and development and are clear about waste disposal, etc. Only by doing so, can we say that a machine is a truly environmental friendly one.

Print China Daily : What are your suggestions for Chinese government on how to carry out environmental protection measures including the environmental protection of printing industry?

Ya-Ping Zhou : Firstly, it is known to all that the growth of China’s economy is very fast, so it is necessary to keep its developmental speed and the stability of its society to ensure a good developmental environment. Secondly, Chinese government should invest more money in scientific analysis and research and encourage those small and medium-sized enterprises to develop with some favorable policies. Thirdly, Chinese government needs to perfect its legislation, to set specific environmental standards and certifications for enterprises to follow. Last but not the least, China must educate its people to be aware of environmental protection through various channels.

Print China Daily : How is the NPES project Printing, Publishing and Converting Technology Training Centre doing ?

Ya-Ping Zhou : It has been almost 12 years since the beginning of the centre and it is doing good with spreading awareness of American Products in the Chinese market. Twelve years ago, when we started the PPCTTC Training courses, we had almost 12 batches in a month which has now come down to almost one in three months. I too feel that the time has come for now training in management rather than operations of machines are such. There was a time when people did not have money to buy the very best machines in the world, but today it is not the case. In fact now the Chinese Industry needs higher levels of managerial courses and that is what we are offering now. How to make decent money out of the best machines in our printshops is what NPES is now offering to the Chinese market.

Print China Daily : Anything new for the Chinese market from NPES?

Ya-Ping Zhou : We are now focusing on now taking more delegations to the US for interaction with the US manufacturers of machinery. We also have plans to organize higher level courses in the US for CEOs, Presidents and General Managers of Chinese companies. We believe china today is in need of higher level of human resources at the higher management level. Also, we are very regular in undertaking market studies for the Chinese market, we procure data from various sources and then analyze them for the benefit of the printing community to give then reports of issues which confront them every now and then.

Print China Daily : How is the e-commerce activity on your site doing ?

Ya-Ping Zhou : We started it in 2003 and took us an year and a half to actually put it into use for the members. Chinese industry people are frequent users inorder for them to find US products and supplies as may be required them. It is bi-lingual and is of much use to the entire Chinese Printing Fraternity.

Print China Daily : What are your comments about the recession.

Ya-Ping Zhou : The global recession in fact has affected the print industry in China. Lots of jobs from overseas customers have either been cancelled or the quantities reduced to the recession. But at the same time I must add that we must see this particular recession as a good thing and should be taken with a positive bent of mind. There are two things tat I wish to point out here – one is China is a sitting on a huge pile of cash and secondly the Chinese banking system is a real solid one and has incredible strength in its foundations and if you look at it, these are the two things which the western word does not have as such and we see the result as well. Now, I also wish to add here that China was in fact trying to cool down the speed of development even before the whole recession thing happened and also to be noted is the need for China to bring its produce level to international standards in general. This is the time for a little bit of rethinking and churning of the whole scenario, to learn from our mistakes and to make things better by the time the whole scenario returns back to normal.