FBA Blog
I have been involved with Fibre Box Association’s (FBA) standing committees for many years, both as a member company representative and as an FBA staff member.
I’ve chaired committees, participated on committees and acted as a staff liaison to different committees.
In fact, it was a phone call I made to say I could no longer chair a committee that led to my return to the association staff.
I believe very strongly in the well-established committee structure at FBA.
The work of FBA’s committees benefits individual companies by bringing together the knowledge, resources and expertise of numerous companies, both large and small.
The information shared in the committees helps to address common challenges, to establish industry positions, to share best practices and to ultimately help member companies make better individual decisions.
As a group, the committees identify, understand and prioritize key issues that impact our industry and work to find solutions that could not be achieved by one company acting alone.
Getting to Know the Committees
FBA’s largest, and one of its most active committees, is the
Technical Committee
. The committee recently completed research on relative humidity environmental factors impacting long-standing safety factors used for manufacturing boxes. The committee is currently working on two other research projects. One, on unitizing pallet-load environmental-design factors and the other on how industry popular score-types affect box compression.
These research projects along with ongoing efforts to develop industry-wide responses to frequently asked technical questions and content maintenance of the
Fibre Box Handbook
are central to the work of the committee.
The
Environmental Committee
is now working with the National Council for Air and Stream Improvement, Inc. on a box plant particulate air emissions project and updating the Air Emissions Inventory Tracking Workbook which is used throughout the industry for annual reporting.
The
Safety and Health Committee
is developing the control of hazardous energy (Lockout-Tagout) and personal protection equipment (PPE) recommendations for FBA members. Both are guidelines that are evolving and improving as committee members share examples and discuss the value of the specific advice.
The
Legal Advisory Committee
is working to update FBA’s Antitrust Guidelines and was responsible for guiding the development of the Antitrust training video released in 2019.
The
Marketing Committee
lent their experience to the creation of the industry tagline, “
Boxes. The Most Extraordinary Ordinary Thing in the World
” and the
Data Services Committee
is continually reviewing our cornerstone data programs and supporting the development of new reports.
Why get involved?
These core committees and the member company representatives who participate on them are essential to the work we do as an association. FBA could not achieve our mission to grow, protect and enhance the overall well-being of the industry without the committee members who volunteer their time and expertise to better the industry as a whole.
If you are not on a committee, I encourage you to get involved.
In 2020, three of FBA’s standing committees pivoted with the pandemic and began meeting virtually for shorter agendas every 6-8 weeks.
The change has been well-received by members who typically met during two in-person meetings each year.
A general description of each committee can be found on the
Issues
tab on the
FBA website
. You can also logon to view agendas and minutes from recent meetings.
This will give you further insight into a particular committee’s work.
And if you’re not quite ready to be an active participant, you can always become an “info-copy” to a committee which means you’ll receive agendas and minutes direct to your inbox without formally joining a committee.
So, what’s stopping you? Get involved.
We’re always looking for additional expertise and a fresh perspective and you gain so much in return – a chance to interact with and learn from industry peers, a seat for your company at the table when discussing issues that impact the industry and exposure to both knowledge and resources that can help in your everyday jobs.
To join a committee, contact FBA staff, Mary Alice Drain (
mdrain@fibrebox.org
) for Technical, Environmental and Safety and Health committees; Peggy Lacy (
placy@fibrebox.org
) for Data Services committee; and me (
rkenyon@fibrebox.org
) for Marketing and Legal Advisory committees.
Rachel