Q. Please tell us about your current role. What are your key focus areas and responsibilities?
A. I am right now the Executive Director at Kingfa Science & technology (India) Ltd . I take care of the entire operations for the entire Kingfa India and am responsible for the growth and overall profitability of the company.

Q. In your opinion, what do you consider to be the greatest development in the plastics compounding sector in recent years?
A. In the recent years, we saw the compounding industries making inroads into multiple new areas and the biggest of them is related to 'Sustainability' Today we can see the focus on creating a closed-loop system for plastics where materials are recycled, reused, and repurposed within the industry and these have become the key priorities 'Green' has become the watch word and talking in terms of carbon foot print has become the order of the day. What was once considered a 'Dirty game' has now become the most sought after – this is to say about the recycling How to offer uncompromised performance for different polymers whilst recycling more and more of the same in a product is today's Fashion as well as Passion. To this end, the compounding industry has made appreciable improvements in the machinery and has done wonders in formulation. Not only this, the compounding industry has made quantum jumps in assuring quality of the required level batch after batch irrespective of what is being recycled. Offering products of the same quality every time and all the time is what is on offer now. The shift toward circularity has reduced waste and reliance on virgin plastic, while significantly improving sustainability across the supply chain.

Q. What special opportunities and challenges do you see in the Indian market compared to other regions?
A. India has it's own challenges while we talk about the market. Every customer expects the right product at the lowest possible pricing. To add to that, everyone needs sustainable / Green product. The investment and the cost incurred in acquiring the right quality recycled material is yet to strike the end-users. The lack of efficient collection, sorting, and recycling infrastructure limits the widespread use of recycled content in compounds, which hinders our ability to fully embrace circular economy principles on a large scale. The biggest challenge for the compounders is to develop the right vendors who can offer recycled material with proper traceability on a continuous basis. For this the involvement of the compounder to work with the recyclers, both financially and technically, is paramount. The ability of the compounders to get the right prices for the products is the nest biggest challenge.

Q. How do you see the sector developing in the next five to ten years? How are customer requirements changing?
A. Customer requirements evolve continuously. As I mentioned earlier, 'Sustainability is above all other needs. Every OEM aspires to be Carbon Neutral at the earliest. That pressure would get translated more and more to their suppliers Compounders, by virtue of being the major material suppliers to the industry, will also evolve matching the industry needs, both in terms of quality and quantity and of course meeting them economically. Whether it's a unique polymer blend for a specific performance or a tailored solution for lightweighting, we need to be able to develop and supply highly specialized compounds to meet the diverse needs of our customers. The Quality System will undergo enormous changes in all through the supply chain leading to transparency in operations as we move forward.

Q. You will be speaking at the Recycling and Compounding Expo in India, could you give us a preview of what you will be talking about?
A. I would like to give out a clarion call to the OEMs and end users alike, to think in terms of the enormous effort that is going into developing high quality and sustainable vendors for recycled content that the compounding industry needs. The effort being invested into developing high-quality, sustainable vendors for recycled materials is extraordinary. To that effect, value has to be placed on recycled content. We should stop thinking recycled content as cost saver and instead think recycled content as the Saviour for our future generations to lead a healthy and safer life.