EU 'must encourage new business'
More must be done to encourage people to start up their own businesses, the final major event of Ireland’s EU Presidency was told today.
Trade and Commerce Minister Michael Ahern said prevailing attitudes to entrepreneurship and the current balance of risks and rewards appeared to make many Europeans less likely to set up new companies.
“This negative perception must be addressed urgently and at all levels if the European Union is to have any chance of reaching the 10-year targets for employment and competitiveness set at the Lisbon Summit in 2000,” Mr Ahern told an international summit in Dublin.
Mr Ahern addressed the opening of the two-day conference in Dublin Castle on the European Charter for Small Enterprises, which is the final formal event of Ireland’s EU Presidency.
The event was designed to stimulate exchange of good practice to help improve the small business environment throughout the EU.
The attendance includes senior officials and business representatives from 34 countries, including all the EU Member States.
Minister Ahern said the small enterprises charter, drawn up in 2000, was one of the key instruments designed at delivering the Lisbon Summit objectives.
The signatory countries have pledged themselves to developing a framework, which would encourage entrepreneurial activity, facilitate access by small enterprises to the best research and technology, and ensure access to markets.
Minister Ahern said all entrepreneurs did not fit into the same category.
“On the contrary they are extraordinarily diverse, coming from a wide range of backgrounds, with very different educational qualifications and skills, very mixed age and experience profiles, very different attitudes to risk and very different motivations,” he said.
“Faced with such diversity, it seems clear that there can be no single magic formula that will deliver significant progress in improving the entrepreneurial culture in an economy.
“On the contrary it points to the need for a wide range of diverse actions, each tailored to the needs of particular niches or sub-groups.”
The minister said the exchange of ideas between member states was one of the keys to success.
EU Commissioner for Enterprise Jan Figel told the conference small and medium-sized businesses provided more than two-thirds of total private sector employment in the EU, a much higher proportion than in the US or Japan.
“Europe’s competitiveness depends strongly on our small businesses,” he said.
“They are a key source of jobs, a breeding ground for business ideas and a main driver of entrepreneurship.
“The often large differences in terms of economic performance between the new and old Member States imply real challenges. But enlargement has also broadened the spectrum of entrepreneurial traditions and solutions to common policy challenges.”
The conference concludes tomorrow with an address by Tánaiste and Enterprise Minister Mary Harney on the final day of Ireland’s six-month term in the EU Presidency.
