Malmo, 23/04/2001 (Agence Europe) - The EU Finance Ministers accompanied by their central bankers, met on Saturday, for the first time, their counterparts from the accession candidate countries, in the presence of Commissioners Pedro Solbes, Gunter Verheugen and Fritz Bolkestein, President Romano Prodi, the President of the European Investment Bank (EIB), Philippe Maystadt, and the European Central Bank President Wim Duisenberg. In total, 68 people sat around the table to give the send off to an intensified dialogue between the EU and the candidate countries over the economic policy aimed at helping them in their accession strategy and to prepare them for the multilateral monitoring procedures. The talks covered financial and macro-economic stability and the Ecofin President, Bosse Ringholm, welcomed this "historic opportunity". The Slovenian Finance Minister, Brigita Schmognerova, spoke of "fruitful meeting" and "encouraging signals", adding that this form of dialogue should take place twice per year. We hope that this becomes a tradition, even if, let us hope, it is of a short duration. We want to become members of the EU as quickly as possible, she said.
The Finance Ministers especially showed their desire to be associated with the enlargement process, and insisted on the implementing of the Copenhagen economic criteria, without adding, of course, any conditions additional conditions to these criteria. The Finance Ministers did not broach - officially at least - the issue of the cost of enlargement, but the French Minister Laurent Fabius stated that this process must be economically reasonable. The German Hans Eichel warned that the countries, which are not ready "would suffer a great shock that could lead to serious social problems". Spain, on its side, passed around a document on the consequences of enlargement for regional aid (see below).
Mr Ringholm recognised that significant challenges have been revealed in the period preceding accession, but also that the talks confirmed the potential for significant growth in some candidates, they showed the extent to which the needs for investment and the low savings rate threaten to worsen the situation. The healthy financing of the current account deficits was identified as one of the greatest macro-economic challenges for the candidate countries. Commissioner Pedro Solbes felt that the meeting was a premonition of the future Ecofin that will take lace after accession, and that it is crucial for the candidates to achieve true convergence. And also to attract more investment, and this, while considering it inevitable for them to experience a period of State deficit. He warned that, "from the European Commission's point of view, it will be necessary to apply a budgetary policy, and a monetary policy that ensures a balanced situation. According to him the catch-up process for the economies of the candidate countries is underway. As for their entry into EMU a meeting on the pre-accession economic programmes will take place in Stockholm on 27 June at the Secretaries of State level, and a second group of programmes will be presented in October, added Mr Solbes. On the basis of two documents from the talks, the European Commission will present a summary document to the Ecofin Council in December.
On several occasions, emphasis was placed on the crucial role of the financial markets, which must be based on solid legal and administrative infrastructures. With regards to this, the Governor of the German Central Bank Ernst Welteke noted that the "banking sector in the candidate countries is still underdeveloped".
Several speakers underlined the demographic challenges faced by the Member States and the candidate countries and put forward the need to guarantee the long-term viability of State finances by carrying out the reform of the pension, health and care for the elderly systems. As an example, a document from the Czech government reveals a fall in the death rate, coupled with, in 2030, the male population over 65 years of age should have doubled.