During the IIAR's business meeting at the start of the conference, Bowles, a retired Evapco executive, said the effort to link up with the Chinese refrigeration industry culminated last year when he and M. Kent Anderson, IIAR president, led a delegation to China in order "to develop a working relationship with the Chinese Association of Refrigeration and the Chinese Internal Trade Engineering Design and Research Institute; the organization responsible for the design and approval of most new industrial refrigeration facilities in China."
He said the effort included "a formal cooperative agreement between IIAR and the Chinese Association of Refrigeration" and the conducting of a refrigeration seminar for the Design Institute in Beijing.