Communication is key to the mission of safety in the gases industry, and particularly so in a region as culturally diverse as the Asia-Pacific.

The Asia Industrial Gases Association (AIGA) worked harder than ever towards this objective last year, against the backdrop of a global pandemic that first emerged in Asia-Pacific and proceeded to ravage many countries and economies throughout the region.

As AIGA Secretary General Milan Sarkar explained in Part 1 of our exclusive interview for gasworld Asia-Pacific, not only did this fundamentally change the game for the association and its members on a frontline level in 2020 – it also created numerous other challenges and opportunities along the way.

As AIGA moves into 2021 with great vigour, Sarkar describes here in Part 2 of our interview how its aims for the year ahead are not only to stay focused on this role in a continuing pandemic, but to further extend its outreach into ‘new’ markets and geographies.

This, he explains, is because the very make-up of the region is one of diversity – rendering the core pillar of harmonisation and safety one of the biggest challenges ahead.