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Letter from our CEO and COO
It is with great pleasure we present to you the second BelchimAnnual Report.
Last year’s initiative to launch the first annual report was well received by
our clients, employees, and other stakeholders. Again, this year we would
like to share how we performed in the past year and what we have in mind
for the future.
2021 was a year with a lot of significant changes and challenges. By the
end of 2020, the vaccinations provided an accelerated pathway out of the
COVID pandemic. A great triumph for science to find a solution so quickly
and impressive to see the willingness of regulatory authorities to approve
solutions at an unprecedented speed. It could serve as an example in the
Crop Protection world, showing that with adequate expertise and resources
there is no need to spend multiple years evaluating well-prepared dossiers.
The early hope of a quick return to normality was shattered by the
unexpected behaviour of the virus, still being transmittable over vaccinated
people, the emerging new variants, but also due to some societal resistance
to vaccination. Also here we see parallels with our own industry. Not only a
reminder that we are dealing with living organisms that are highly adaptable
to their environment and quick to develop resistance to effective control
measures but also that there is no ‘magic bullet’; the most sustainable control
is best achieved by combinations of the best technical advice, effective and
efficient products combined with ‘cultural controls’ like good hygiene and
awareness of infection risks.
Close to two years since the pandemic began, the economy has adapted
largely and so has our way of living. Face masks are part of our daily life,
we are still cautious in travelling and Teams and Zoom jingles have become
familiar sounds.
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