I am extremely pleased to join this celebratory ceremony of the 12th edition of the Young Entrepreneur Prize.

Since this is one of the oldest national prizes dedicated to entrepreneurs, it has distinguished several generations of young people who have been asserting themselves, throughout the years, in the Portuguese and international entrepreneurial stage.

It is thus fully justified to praise the pioneering vision and the work carried out by the successive officers of ANJE, who have so greatly contributed towards the rating and the full social recognition of young entrepreneurialism.

This ceremony occurs at a time when Portugal is living through one of the most stringent periods of its recent history. The necessary correction of the budgetary and macroeconomic imbalances generates pronounced difficulties in market liquidity and in access to credit by national companies, a situation that, if not swiftly overcome, could enhance the weaknesses of our economic and social fabric.

The challenge that is placed on all of us today is to be capable of contributing towards a swift recovery of the Portuguese economy, sustained on competitive investment to generate external revenue and employment.

As I have been often stating, the path to re-launching our economy is fundamentally in the hands of entrepreneurs, particularly of the young entrepreneurs.

Our economy faces growth problems and the domestic market does not generate enough demand to overcome this situation. And, notwithstanding an unfavourable environment, the path towards sustainable growth cannot but be the adoption of strategies guided towards the external markets.

Investment in sectors of production of transactional goods and services, capable of competing in external markets must thus be one of our main priorities.

This was the reason why I decided to dedicate this stage of the Route to Youth to the theme of entrepreneurialism and to creative industries. This is not a novel choice, since I have for long been pointing out this sector as capable of providing economic diversification, innovation, sustainable growth of exports and the creation of high added value employment. These are the activities that favour the renewal of degraded urban areas and the conservation of the cultural and environmental heritage.

The global market for creative industries has obtained, in the last decade, unprecedented dynamism. In a significant number of countries, creative economy has grown at a much faster rate than that of the remaining economy.

The labour intensive demand indicates that employment in creative economy could represent one in each ten employees. The high added value deriving from knowledge, specific skills and qualification of the labour force confers upon being employed in creative production the features of qualified and sustainable employment.

But investment in creative industries is far above economic and employment creation. Providing drive for creative companies also comprises the defence of our cultural heritage, the recovery, preservation and renewal of traditional arts and crafts, and the promotion of greater social cohesion.

This is why I have endeavoured to single out, in the several routes dedicated to the innovatory local communities, the good examples of projects that aim towards revitalizing industry and, at the same time, towards social cohesion, through the creative reinvention of traditional activities.

Porto and the country’s northern regions are particularly evident due to the dynamism of a creative economy guided towards the production and marketing of highly specific and differentiated goods and services.

The rich cultural and architectural heritage, the educational establishments and the quality equipment, the human capital embodied in talented creators, the enterprising energy, are the basic factors of the competitiveness of the Northern region and provide it with the just ambition of leadership in the field of European creative economy.

As I asserted when delivering an address in the 25 April celebrations, the cultural and intellectual vitality of the people of Porto is not novel, such as there is no novelty as to their talent and dynamism, their determination in approaching what is new and different, their propensity in assuming intelligent risks.

Porto, as the capital of a large region, is clearly turned towards exercising the role of a dynamic nucleus of a national creative source. Its urban matrix, bringing together tradition with modernism, is gradually becoming converted into a marker of international and cosmopolitan progression, where creators of great talent and entrepreneurs driven with a sense of opportunity are converging.

The dynamics of specific initiatives, such as company incubators, the centre of creative industries, the forums of creativity and entrepreneurialism, are good examples of regional coordination and of the alignment of resources around the political priority of transforming the North of the country into a large European region fit for creative economy.

This sector comprises an enlarged range of activity for young entrepreneurs. We need the audacity in the efficient organization of new companies and in the adjustment of the respective supply to the real conditionings and requirements of external demand.

Gains in competitiveness are needed through increase in productivity, through innovation, through technological development, through partnerships and complementary activities. Creativity, originality and differentiation, decisive factors for success, depend largely from the ambition, energy and talent of youth.

The small size of the companies comprised in our entrepreneurial fabric, always pointed out as a hindrance to its internationalization, could in fact be a competitive advantage, due to its operational flexibility, the creativity and innovation it stimulates and to the greater capability to adapt to global markets in permanent change.

Companies such as those I had the fortunate opportunity to visit during this Route to Youth, dedicated to creative industries, although with different origins and courses, are demonstrative of the correctness of the signalled path. Some, based on family tradition and productive structures, are led today by young entrepreneurs, who knew how to reorganize and how to climb to new stages of entrepreneurial modernity. Others, more recently set up, are based upon the rating of new concepts of convergence between creative production, new technologies and innovation.

But the vitality of youth is felt in all these companies, as well as its spirit for transformation and for the sustainability of its activity in new ideas, in the stimulus of creativity, in the versatile application of technologies, in integrated and adaptable management, and in the proximity to their markets.

As a common denominator to the many creative companies I have visited, led by young entrepreneurs, I verify a new culture in stimulating quality, knowledge, skills and staff qualification.

Young entrepreneurs that believe, even within an adverse environment, that it is possible to transform a good idea into a fruitful business are the sap of a prosperous economy, and represent the axis of a future that is crucial for the global competitiveness and influence of the Portuguese economy.

I thus want to congratulate the winners of the Young Entrepreneur Prize. They are the new generation of a lineage of notable entrepreneurs that have been distinguished by this unarguable meritorious initiative. To you all go my best wishes of entrepreneurial success, based upon the certainty that you will provide a relevant contribution towards the improvement of the well being of the Portuguese.

I also want to utter a final word of appreciation to the just tribute that ANJE decided to render to the memory of Diogo Vasconcelos, which I join, underlining his unique contribution to the cause of entrepreneurialism and innovation. Diogo Vasconcelos, from whose creative and visionary capabilities I benefited, is an example that we must not forget.

Thank you.