 |
|
|||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||||
It is an honour and a great pleasure for me to welcome you here in this conference centre of the Ministry of the Economy, Finance and Industry.
For a day and a half, we shall examine an important issue for growth of businesses, especially the smallest. "Boosting SMEs through Internet".
I won’t insist on this topic ; after all you are here today because you are aware of its importance, and it will presently be discussed by other speakers.
Before presenting the outline of this seminar, I should like to come back to its general framework, which is to exchange best general business practices between the EU Member States.
The creation of seminars, forums and symposiums in this area during the past three years has rapidly enhanced our reciprocal knowledge of brakes to growth of SMEs and the measures taken in every Member State to remove such brakes.
Our talks have shown that the problems of SMEs are basically the same, whether in southern or northern Europe, in Latin or Anglo-Saxon countries. Problems with the creation of businesses, access to finance, bureaucracy, innovation and so on are encountered in all Member States, even if their degree differs according to the history and culture of each.
Hence the interest of comparing our approaches in order to find the best solutions.
I therefore want to thank the Commission for its initiative to organise these seminars, which have the unreserved support of the French authorities.
I also want to thank the chairmen, reporters and speakers who agreed to put their valuable time and expertise at our disposal.
Today’s topic - New Information and Communication Technologies and SMEs - is of the greatest interest for the French government, since it is a largely unexplored sphere of action with a great potential. This is why we offered to host this seminar in Paris.
Our task is, first, to identify best practices in the Community in order to ensure that they benefit the largest number, and, secondly, to produce proposals for solutions for concrete action.
This is a big challenge given the time at our disposal.
Seminar organisation (practical aspects)
This seminar will follow the program included in the kit handed out at the entrance. Nevertheless, I should like to present it briefly.
The plenary session held this morning will be addressed by Mr Francis LORENTZ, Chairman of the French E-Commerce Taskforce, who, despite his busy schedule, agreed to talk on the major challenges of new information technologies for SMEs.
Mr Massimo GARRIBBA from General Directorate XIII, Information, Telecommunications, Markets, Technologies-Innovation and Exploitation of Research, will next present the actions carried forward by the European Commission. His address will be followed by a first question-and-answer period.
At 11:00 o’clock there will be a 30-minute break, which I am asking you respect, after which we will be assigned to 4 workshops, to be presented in a few moments by Mr VO VAN QUI.
Work will be resumed tomorrow morning at 9:00 o’clock in this auditorium and continue until 11:00 o’clock a.m., when the workshop reports will be read and a general debate will be held.
After a break, Mrs Marja EROLA, e-commerce expert at the National Technological Development Centre of Finland and chairwoman of the "OECD Information Economy" working group, will speak on the overall conclusions, which as you know is a so demanding effort. I am grateful that she is willing to accept this heavy burden. The seminar will be closed by Mr Christian PIERRET, Minister of State in charge of Industry.
A buffet lunch will be served before we say goodbye.
My services, represented here by Messrs VO VAN QUI and LAGNIEZ and Miss MURE, are of course at your disposal to help with any problems.
