14 July 2004

This prestigious Award - sponsored by the TT Club, FIATA, and IATA - is aimed at encouraging training in forwarding and enlarging the professional experience of the candidates. The Award is open to young freight forwarders whose age will not be greater than 30 in the competition year and they must have been working full-time in forwarding for at least two years. The winner of the 2004 award is Ms Anita van Kooten (27), from the Netherlands. Anita is working in the project department of MAT Air & Ocean Freight, NL-Zwijndrecht where she deals with various types of shipments for a selected group of customers. She handles export/import consignments overseas - both LCL and FCL - cross trades, road transport all over the world, occasionally rail transports and customs formalities. This years' dissertation was on three completely different shipments (dangerous goods by sea, air freight and an overland container shipment). Anita looked at all means of transport available for this distance and type of cargo and provided alternative cost-benefit calculations. Congratulations go to Anita for her excellent work! The quality of all the dissertations submitted was even higher than in 2003 thus making life difficult for the judges and the Award Steering Group. As is the norm in freight forwarding, such problems were overcome with the sensible application of logic and experience (by the Steering Group). Anita will be invited to attend the FIATA World Congress in Sun City, South Africa - 19 to 23 September 2004 - to be presented with her certificate, trophy and details of the training/experience programmes that she has earned. Since 2003, all candidates that submit a dissertation receive, in addition to a small personal memento of their entry and a certificate of participation in the award, a one-year free personal subscription to International Freighting Weekly. This additional item is by courtesy of the Informa Group - publishers of Lloyd's List and many other fine weekly and monthly publications relative to International Transport. The award is made up of practical and academic training - one week at the IATA training centre closest to the winner's home, one week of training in London on Transport Law and Insurance and two weeks practical training based in one of the TT Club's regional centres, either London, Hong Kong or New Jersey plus one year's free personal subscription of the International Transport Journal (ITZ). The winner also gets the same memento and subscription to IFW that the other candidates receive. The cost of travel, accommodation and practical/academic training is borne by the sponsors of the Award. The overall value of this award is in excess of US$ 35,000. As from 2005 the Award will be run on a regional basis. This means that a regional winner will be selected from each of the four FIATA regions (Africa/Middle East, Americas, Asia/Pacific and Europe). These four regional winners will be invited to Congress free of all costs. One of them will then be declared as the International Winner and receive the additional prizes that relate directly to the International Young Freight Forwarder of the Year. Documentation for the 2005 Award will be distributed to National Associations in late August 2004 with the usual deadline of 15 January 2005 for nominating candidates. We sincerely hope that we shall receive many nominations for the 2005 Award. All National Associations are entitled to present one candidate, and we hope that most of the 93 FIATA registered Associations will make every effort to take part in this Award in 2005. Details of the new way of organising the award can be obtained from the FIATA Secretariat. ENDS

To read Anita's YIFFA dissertation, please click here:Further information for editors:For further information please contact:

Ian Lush

Tel + 44 (0)20 7204 2642

E-mail:

ian.lush@thomasmiller.com
Media contact:

Michael Haig and Peter Owen, ISIS Communications

Tel +44 (0)1737 248300

E-mail:

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