‘Entrepreneurship with a Human Face’ was the topic of the European Economic and Social Committee’s (EESC) Biennial Conference organised in the Athens Concert Hall on 8 and 9 September. The Greek Ministry of Development was co-organiser.
The Biennial Conference marked the end of Mr. Dimitris Dimitriadis’ term of office as President of the EESC and his actions to encourage a more humanistic and social dimension in the way modern entrepreneurship activities are conducted.
EESC President Dimitriadis opened the conference stating that: ‘Our Europe needs to encourage the entrepreneurial spirit at all levels of society and in all forms in order to face the challenges that lie more than ever ahead of us. And by that I am referring to entrepreneurship regarding Corporate Social Responsibility or even better a Responsible Entrepreneurship that both maximises profits and minimizes the risks to the natural and human environment’.
The message the Greek Prime-Minister Costas Karamanlis gave to the audience was that ‘we are obliged to prove that competitiveness in the European economy can be strengthened in a manner that suits the profile of Europe and its civilisation. To achieve this, we need to address entrepreneurship in the broader sense of the term, something that is very difficult. Among the biggest obstacles facing entrepreneurs is government bureaucracy!.
Mrs. Viviane Reding, European Commissioner for Information Society and Media, was one of the four members of the commission that played a role in the conference. In het speech she spoke about the importance of Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SME’s) in Europe and especially in the ICT sector: ‘There are 23 million SME’s in Europe which employ more than 100 million people. The number of SME’s in the ICT sector is estimated around 700.000. Around half of these are considered as ‘innovative’, meaning that they introduce innovations in their products and servoces on regular basis. These SME’s represent a massive source of new ideas and huge potential for growth.’
The President of the European Commission Josι Manuel Barroso on the list of eminent speakers, was called for an urgent visit to Russia’s President Medvedev, together with the President of France Nicolas Sarkozy, to talk about the troubles in the Caucasus. But Mrs. Reding let the audience know what President Barroso had in mind to tell the visitors of the biennial in Athens. ‘Entrepreneurship with a human face is not a contradiction in terms, nor it is an empty slogan. It is something we should encourage’, was his message.
One of the most important results of the conference was the proclamation of a European Charter of Responsible Entrepreneurship.
