What is ASTA Europe?

I guess ASTA Europe has not had enough spotlight to be recognized Internationally by the industry, not only the agglomerate manufacturers, but by everyone in general. ASTA Europe is a European association of agglomerate stone manufacturers. It has currently 15 members, mostly Italian producers, but all the major European agglomerate manufacturers are already members.
This association aims to promote and protect it's members interest, and I figure that more than ever they'll need it. Personally, it sounds like a European Breton family meeting, but who am I to say such a thing. Truth is that they all have common interests, and the main one is protecting their product and their markets.
ASTA Europe was created in 2010, the members meet several times a year, the Marmomacc fair has been a traditional meeting ground for the members, it represents more than 80% of total European production. ASTA Europe has it's origins in the Italian association ANPLA, created about 10 years ago to establish and define standards for the agglomerate stone. ANPLA has been playing an important part in the CE marking for the agglomerate stone industry in Europe. So the Italian association, has overcome their national borders and is now named ASTA Europe, they've expanded membership to all European countries that obide by the references of the European Committee for Standardisation (or the Comité Européen de Normalisation (CEN)). So currently they've got members from Italy, Spain, Romania, Germany, Belgium, Turkey and the Czech Republic.
ASTA Europe wants to continue to play the main part in establishing European standards for the agglomerate stone industry. There are many hidden interests at stake, and most of the European manufacturers have many in common.
So basically I see three things that unite this very restricted group of companies:

• European standards : Participating actively in setting European standards that will protect their product against competition (Chinese mainly)
• Environmental issues: face the environmental issue regarding their industry
• Health and safety issues: face the health issues regarding their production, namely the usage of some health hazard products like resin, quartz, cristobalite and others.