ITSA Appoints New Board
20 May 2021 | Press Releases
Following its 4th Annual General Meeting, held in May 2021, the International Tax Stamp Association (ITSA) has appointed four directors to its board.
Juan Carlos Yañez Arenas of Thomas Greg & Sons, Gerben van Wijk of Luminescence Sun Chemical Security and Zbigniew Sagan of Advanced Track & Trace, have been re-elected by ITSA members to serve an additional term on the board, while Ruggero Milanese of SICPA joins the board in the place of Christine Macqueen, who is retiring from SICPA this year.
In addition to the four appointments, ITSA has confirmed the reappointment of Juan Carlos Yañez Arenas as Chairman, a position which he has held since the founding of ITSA in 2015.
Apart from the aforementioned directors, the board comprises Kelly Smith of Ashton Potter, Marietta Ulrich-Horn of Securikett and Tim Driscoll of Authentix.
ITSA’s activities for the current year include a series of webinars for tax authorities, other regulators and NGOs, on the themes of:
- Tracking and tracing of tobacco products: lessons learned and best practices
- Why we still need overt security features in the digital age
- Bringing ISO standards alive with best practice tax stamp models
- Excise into the future – cannabis, vaping and other new markets (including link with non-excise products)
The first webinar on the list – tracking and tracing of tobacco products – will focus on the upcoming revision process for the EU Tobacco Products Directive (including its track and trace and security features provisions), as well as the WHO FCTC Secretariat guidelines for implementing Article 8 of the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products. The webinar will present an overview of these regulations, highlighting strengths and weaknesses, and providing recommendations for achieving an effective and cost-efficient system that works on a global scale.
In all, ITSA now has 24 members, up from 23 in 2020, with the latest company to join its ranks being Schwarz Druck GmbH in Germany. ITSA is, however, urging other organisations to join the association. Membership is open to legally incorporated companies that supply tax stamp components and features, finished tax stamps, equipment for stamp design, manufacture, application and authentication, and systems for coding and marketing stamps.
ITSA has also created an associate membership category, essentially to allow tax authorities and other government authorities, with an established interest in tax stamps, to work more closely with solution providers to shape the direction of tax stamp specification, deployment and implementation.
