Welcome to the Official page of the Presidency of the Portuguese Republic

I am very pleased to greet all the participants in this Conference, wishing them an excellent stay in Lisbon.

Allow me to congratulate the European Commission for having decided, jointly with its partner in Portugal, the Foundation for Science and Technology, to hold ICT2015 in our Country, the largest European event dedicated to Information and Communication Technologies.

This is a demonstration of Europe’s vitality in science, technology and in the more advanced applications of ITC in multiple areas.

It is equally an excellent opportunity to come into contact with state of the art technological applications, to apprize the talent of entrepreneurs and researchers and to establish a dialogue with the regulators and with the officers responsible for public services, with a view towards an exchange of experiences and perspectives which will surely be fruitful overall.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I believe it will not be exaggerated to state that the assemblage of technologies present at this Meeting contains enough potential to change companies’ organizations through their impact on the existing social and economic structure.

Similarly to what happened in the past with the railways, with electric power or with mechanization, the benefits of these technologies tend to be successively diffused, with effects that are protracted in time and space, irreversibly changing economic and social models and opening the way to a new era of development and wealth creation.

The modernizing power of a new technological revolution foreshadows the transition to a higher level of productivity, when furthering the modernization of all industries and sectors and the reorganization of the relations amongst the different areas of activity.

Historical analysis allows concluding that the absorption of new technologies by the economy is a complex process, generator of crises and with undeniable short term social costs. It cannot be excluded that, at a first moment, the ongoing technological revolution could give rise to tensions before producing benefits visible to the whole of society.

Some symptoms of this process are already visible in the more advanced economies and societies. Noteworthy are phenomena such as the obsolescence of methods and skills, the emergence of costs and barriers to training, the difficulties in readjustments and the absorption of the labour force by the new industries, with more or less intense effects in the allocation of resources, in general, and in employment, in particular.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

In times of change we must recognize that, should signs exist of a promising future, there can also exist, mostly in a first moment, a critical level of social demand, which calls for an adequate answer to the new challenges by the institutional domains.

This is, for many, a time of uncertainty, especially for those who, having lost their jobs, face difficulties in returning to the labour market.

This is a time of uncertainty also for the leaders of enterprises who are unable to reverse the trend in the lowering of their results, or even for the public officers, who ascertain that the formulas and measures of the past do not achieve the desired effects.

A change of this size requires a large effort in investment and training, whether individual or collective, in a process that will last, I believe, several generations to consolidate.

It is in this context of accelerated change that we cannot continue ignoring the signs of intense social stress that the change is inducing, especially when facing inequalities that persist in the access to employment and in the distribution of wealth.

Centrifugal trends appear in post-industrial societies where inequality affects a significant part of individuals and families, regions and countries, at the same time as other nations cruise along or prosper, freed from the classic mechanisms of control, of sharing and distribution of wealth.

We live, in short, in times of great challenges.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The difficulties felt by the existing institutional cadres to deal with the new technological revolution are indeed very visible.

We require, equally here, innovation, institutional innovation to promote a greater rate of absorption and diffusion of technology in all economic fields and to obtain maximum benefits from the wealth creation potential that the ICT’s open to society and the economy.

This institutional recovery must be focused on guiding the new technologies to improve the efficiency and the real productive capacity to boost job creation, combating, at the same time, inequality and exclusion.

The need is for policies that interpret the new technological and economic model in this critical stage, while being conscious that changes in the institutions are much slower and complex than changes occurred in science, in technology or in the economy itself.

It is also fundamental to set conditions for the regulating powers to become effective and, above all, to ensure the compatibility between the modernization of the productive system, the stability of the financial system and the strengthening of social cohesion.

The effectiveness of this balance will determine the conditions for sustainable growth in Europe during the next decades, reverting the cycle of successive crises and of protracted economic stagnation.

Within the framework of the ICT’s I stress the special priority conferred by the European agenda to the regulation of the Internet, to the transparency and to the equilibrium in the regulation of telecommunications, of the audio-visual, of the media and of the new models of digital business, as well as to the issues of cybersecurity and of the safeguarding of privacy.

Indeed, it is necessary to ensure compatibility between innovation, security and the fundamental rights, considering the opportunities, but also the threats that the new technological border can mean to citizens’ freedoms.

In all these challenges, the understanding of the role and of the potential of the ICT’s by the public powers will be crucial to find new solutions for the signs of weakness that are very visible all over Europe.

An institutional and social context adequate to the new technological standards will create conditions for a healthy and harmonious growth, namely in the case of employment in the new generations.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The main theme of this Conference is the global digital economy and the role of the Single Digital Market as a factor of Europe’s competitiveness and leadership.

The progress of the European Digital Agenda is undeniable, notwithstanding the different rates of progress in the several Member States. Since the Single Digital Market is one of the priorities of the European Commission, it is fundamental that these differences are mitigated, creating policies that promote a swift convergence of the various countries in this field.

It will equally be necessary to ensure the promotion of digital skills at every level, to develop the safety and confidence of users in digital networks, and create favourable conditions to pursue the investment in the infrastructure of the new generations of wide band networks and to guarantee citizens’ fundamental rights.

Digital economy is an economy of networks, algorithms, flows of products, services and contents. This new economy is progressively converging with the physical economy and the border between them will ever be more difficult to establish.

For this reason, the paths of prosperity are open to those who better understand and more swiftly anticipate how this crossroads between the physical and the digital worlds will be processed.

I am certain that this Conference will relevantly contribute towards understanding the challenges of the digital revolution, to be acquainted with the most recent technological developments and, ultimately, to sensitize society to the opportunities that are offered us.

I wish you all an excellent working session, and also remind you not to miss the hospitality and beauty of the city of Lisbon.

Thank you very much.