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The centenary of Agricultural Credit in Portugal is an extremely relevant event and a celebration that I have sponsored since its very beginning.

My attending this Conference is a sign of public recognition for the work that has been carried out in the last one hundred years and underlines the importance for Portuguese agriculture and other rural activities to have available adequate conditions of financing in order to improve the modernization process and the adaptation to the demands of our times.

I equally want to signal the decisive contribution that Agricultural Credit, as a network of associative cooperative banking, has given towards cohesion and for the economic and social development of our Country, in all its diverse regions.

I thus salute its officers – the Chairman of the Board of Fenacam (National Federation of Agricultural Mutual Associations), the President of the General and Supervisory Board of the Central Credit Bank and the Chairman of the Board of the Central Credit Bank – and all those, officers, associates and employees, who believed in and worked for this project throughout its hundred year history.

Since this centenary is equally the centenary of many local Credit Banks, which are still operating, on their own or integrated with other similar institutions, I would like to address a special tribute the Elvas, Mourão, and Reguengos Credit Banks; to the Serpa, Alcáçovas and Viana do Alentejo Credit Banks; to the Aljustrel, Alcochete, Pernes and S. Teotónio Credit Banks, all of them set up in 1911.

I am well aware of the importance of the activity of the Mutual Agricultural Credit Banks, whose historic roots date from the 18th century, but whose real foundation dates from the beginning of the Republican era.

Their contribution to the development of our economy is unarguable, especially in our rural areas. The micro, small and medium sized companies dedicated to agriculture and other rural activities have greatly benefited from the organization of agricultural credit, in their management model and in their performance, and above all through the bonds of proximity developed with the local communities, which allow an activity that is particularly well adjusted to our country’s reality.

The already lengthy history of Mutual Agricultural Credit records, as is natural, periods of expansion and periods of stagnation and difficulties. But, levelling out this centenary path, we must reach the conclusion that Agricultural Credit arrived at our days full of power, with objectives laid out for the future and results which its officers and associates can be proud of. Its relevance is well demonstrated by the fact that the number of associates of the Mutual Agricultural Credit Banks is these days in excess of half a million and their customers are clearly more than double this number.

In spite of their notable development and the expansion of their activities the Agricultural Credit Banks have not shifted away either from their original mission to support agriculture, where they recruit the main body of their associates, or from the essentially rural areas, where the majority of their branches are located.

The Agricultural Credit Group has become, in its own right, conquered by its achievements, one of the main Portuguese financial groups. It is a modern Group, partner in the development of the rural world, and well integrated in the economic and social fabric of all the Country’s regions, with its response adapted to local needs.

Thus, and notwithstanding the generalized difficulties that are being faced by the national financial system, I cannot but emphasize the good results recorded by the Group in the last few years, largely resulting from a progressive adoption of good practices in their credit system, from its proximity rationale, from awareness of local reality and from an important effort in financial consolidation, very visibly successful.

In effect, this Group has known how and been able, in times of particular uncertainty, to safeguard the criteria of solvability and vigour that are so essential for the healthy operation of the financial system and of the economy.

As we are all aware, the hundred years of Agricultural Credit, whose celebrations are comprised in this Conference, coincide with a very difficult moment for Portugal and for all the Portuguese.

We are living today one of the more complex periods of our recent History. An internationally disturbing period, very delicate as to the strength of the bonds that have linked Europe and, above all, very critical for our economy, branded today by the vital need to correct unsustainable imbalances that have lately been emphasized.

In spite of the sacrifices that are demanded from all of us in order to overcome our current difficulties, financial institutions, in particular, continue obliged to carry out a very relevant mission. First of all, to support entrepreneurship, private and local initiative and as an aid to companies and citizens that although vulnerable to the current crisis have not lost their intrinsic potential.

The calamity of prolonged unemployment and the emigration of thousands of young people contrast with uninhabited fields, with the ageing and desertification of the Country’s interior. This apparent paradox leads us to think of innovative solutions, in order to create new opportunities for self employment and rural entrepreneurship, especially in regions that are needier in demographic terms and enjoy a higher agricultural potential.

We require a programme of agrarian populating that can capture a part of the unused human resources.

For this reason I would gladly view a joining of efforts, between public and private bodies, aiming to create incentive measures for settling and attracting people to rural areas, providing them with opportunities to contribute towards the increase in production and to the recovery of the heritage of the Portuguese rural world.

The incentives for employment and for young farmers, the support of insertion enterprise, and the concession of micro credit for rural development projects could be some of such solutions,

What I request from all of you, is an additional effort in the sense of providing opportunities, at this time, to whoever shows the will to work and to contribute towards overcoming the crisis that lies amongst us.

I am certain that the values of cooperation and solidarity, which have guided the activity of the Agricultural Banks since 1911, are still well alive in these days.

Rural Portugal, with special emphasis on the agricultural, forestry and food production sectors, the micro, small and medium sized companies and local initiatives, whose development is determining in order to ensure the fundamental balance of our Country, requires institutions such as Agricultural Credit Banks.

Credit Banks are subject, such as the remaining credit institutions, to a competitive logic that demands from them great management capability. But we must not forget that their tradition, their centenary culture and their specific objectives turn them into proximity development instruments, in which solidarity and even social inclusion are present. At this time, when in addition to economic risks, severe risks also exist of grievous social reversal, this mission of the Agricultural Banks is doubly important.

I end by wishing Agricultural Credit and all Mutual Agricultural Credit Banks, their officers, employees and associates, the greatest professional and personal success.

You already lengthy history, your determination, your sense of responsibility are the foremost guarantees that you will continue to be of service to Portugal and to the Portuguese, and to the economic and social development of all our regions.

To all of you, my sincere congratulations for this life of one hundred years.

Thank you very much