Welcome to the page of the State Visit to Poland

Mister President Lech Kaczynski, Excellency,
Honourable Ministers,
Honourable Secretary of State,
Honourable Ambassadors,
Renowned Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

I would like to start by addressing my special thanks to President Lech Kaczynski for his presence in this Economic Seminar, which greatly honours us. I would also like to congratulate the Polish and Portuguese investment and external trade agencies for the organization of this excellent initiative, aided by the contributions of the Polish-Portuguese Chamber of Commerce, and by the discussion held by the entrepreneurs.

I salute and thank all the participants for their presence here.

I must confess that I feel a special admiration for Poland and for the Polish nation. I am greatly impressed by the fierce attachment to their identity and independence, which resisted and remained unexhausted throughout the greatest tribulations of its history of many centuries.

I am well aware of Poland’s contribution towards Central and Eastern Europe’s rejoining freedom and democracy, and the active role it early came to play in multilateral institutions and in the European construction. And I have kept in touch, with great interest, with the very successful management of the vast process of political, institutional and economic transformation of the country, which anyway culminated in its adhesion to the European Union in 2004, and has been reflected by a notable economic achievement, and by a strong capacity for attraction of foreign direct investment.

Poland has meanwhile become Portugal’s main partner in Central and Eastern Europe. It is the 4th largest market for Portuguese foreign investment. There are already a significant number of companies with Portuguese capital, with some instances of great success. But I believe we are still running short of our potential, since the size and depth of the trade relations between our countries, although relatively dynamic, shows there is still much to explore.

Without going ahead with a process of mutual discovery, it will not be easy for us to take full advantage of our common membership of that great space of freedom of circulation of goods, services, people and capital which is the European single market.

As such it is important, in this perspective, to muster with greater relevance the wills of the economic, political and cultural agents. But it is also fundamentally important to provide the conditions for a greater dissemination of the opportunities for bilateral cooperation, for communication to be established and for business to materialize.

For this exact reason, I must stress the opportunity given us by this Seminar and the Entrepreneurial Meetings towards the strengthening of the economic ties between our two countries. To start with, by providing closer contacts between Portuguese and Polish entrepreneurs and highly placed individuals. And yet more, by contributing towards a better knowledge of what is currently produced in Poland and in Portugal, very close to each other as community partners but also rapidly mutant economies and which, geographically, occupy opposing borders in the area of the European Community.

Portugal, that adhered in the eighties to a 10 Member-State Community, and became one of the founder countries of the Euro zone, is well acquainted with the challenges of European integration. And we all know that the growing globalization which we have been witnessing in the last decades brings with it challenges and opportunities on an unprecedented scale.

In order to answer these challenges, Portugal has been going through great changes and is carrying out a relevant set of reforms, not just in the range of the economy but also in many other areas. The structure of the Portuguese economy is changing very rapidly, and this is visible in the structure of exports, which is quickly being removed from the characteristic standard of specialization of many years, and in the positioning of traditional exports in the value chain.

A new generation of enterprises and entrepreneurs has been growing, some of which with a global vocation, in areas with heavy scientific and cultural content – software applications, information, robotics and communication technology, biotechnology, renewable energy.

Some of these enterprises are present in the entrepreneurial retinue which accompanies me in this State Visit to Poland, and is representative, at the highest level, of several of the most dynamic sectors of the Portuguese economy and of an entrepreneurial class growingly oriented towards innovation and internationalization.

Enterprises whose capability, knowledge, prestige and international experience are placed in a position of advantage to meet many of the investment and cooperation needs associated with the current stage of development of the Polish economy, such as transport and communications infrastructures, home equipment, energy sector, automobile industry and Information and Communication Technology.

Regarding the latter sector, I must make reference to the significant exhibits we brought of the development and innovation we produce nowadays in our country – “Portugal – Global Technology” – exhibits which we will show later in the Palace of Culture and Science, quite near here, and which will be open to the public during next week. I invite you all to visit it!

These are enterprises that well illustrate the Portugal of this century, a modern and welcoming country, with a vast cultural heritage, excellent infrastructures and a highly developed financial system. An open economy favourable to foreign investment and to new technologies and which is able to show, notwithstanding its small size, multiple centres of technological excellence and entrepreneurial creativity.

Portugal and Portuguese enterprises have much to offer Poland. And Poland, in its turn, has surely much to offer Portugal. Both can and must, jointly do better than until now.

It is with this conviction that I will end my address. But not before transmitting my confident expectation that the work carried out in this Seminar provides a determining contribution, in order that Polish and Portuguese entrepreneurs may identify and exploit interests and opportunities. In the field, concretely, for mutual benefit.

More than good intent or fine words, it is time to act.

Thank you very much.

Dziêkujê.