Brussels, 15/02/2005 (Agence Europe) - In the 5th Implementation Report of the European Charter for Small Enterprises (SMEs) since 2000 and presented to the press on Tuesday, the European Commission welcomed the progress in promoting small enterprises through learning from each other's good practices has been achieved by Member State signatories to the Charter, particularly in the areas of education for entrepreneurship and skills shortages, especially measures to overcome the lack of skilled technicians and engineers; better regulation and legislation on bankruptcy and “fresh starts”.
Since 2000, when the Charter was adopted by Heads of EU15 Member States and Norway, for improving the legal and administrative framework for SMEs as part of the Lisbon Agenda, it has expanded from the to 20 other countries: the ten new Member States and turkey in 2002, the Balkans in 2003, Moldova and Europe's Mediterranean signatory countries.
In a press statement Commission Vice-President Günter Verheugen welcomed the progress illustrated in this report, which “shows that more and more Member States draw inspiration from measures developed in other countries”. The Commission's DG Enterprise report underlines that: 1) Luxembourg has taken inspiration from Belgium and the Netherlands in appointing a “Commissioner for administrative simplification” within its Ministry in charge of SMEs. 2) Building on the experiences in Ireland and the Netherlands, the Czech Republic is developing a system to monitor skills gaps and to anticipate long-term demand. 2) In close cooperation with Denmark, Estonia is launching a one-stop-shop for companies on how to benefit from the use of design in business activities. 4) joint Member State-Commission projects have been inspired by projects such as “Education for entrepreneurship” based on experiences gained in Estonia, Lithuania, Sweden and Norway and the project on “Restructuring, bankruptcy and a fresh start” has contributed to policy developments in Cyprus, Latvia, Hungary and Norway.
In the area of fostering entrepreneurial mindsets, the report points out that France, the Netherlands, Finland and Norway have established formal links between different sectors of the public administration, notably Ministries of Economy and Education, with the aim of setting up a global entrepreneurship education strategy. Yet, a coherent framework is still missing in many other countries.
The Commission notes that several countries have launched extensive programmes to improve the regulatory environment for businesses in practice, which proves that this dimension is increasingly integrated into EU activities. The Commission underlines that fact that the Netherlands and the United Kingdom are among the leading countries in the use of regulatory impact assessment and good progress has also been made Poland. In Belgium the Kafka test (assessing administrative burden) was introduced.
The Commission notes that bankruptcy law has been improved with for example Spain substantially improving its insolvency law and more opportunities of a fresh start for business failures. In France, the new bill for rescuing enterprises aims at early detection of financial difficulties and promotes a second chance.
In the area of skilled workers, the Commission indicates that most Charter signatories have updates processes for inspecting current and future needs for training skilled workers help SMEs take off. It highlights measures taken Sweden, with a traditional link between universities and enterprises, has set an institutional framework for cooperation to monitor skills needs. Making apprenticeship systems more responsive to market needs: Member States are gradually reviewing their educational and training policies and making them more responsive to current and anticipated structural changes for example in France and more responsive to market needs in Austria. Improving the image of engineering: To tackle the long-term structural skills shortages which often seem to be linked to a poor image of the sector in the public opinion problem, the engineering organisation in Germany has organised the Year of Technology with many PR activities. For further information, consult the report at: http: //http://www.europa.eu.int/comm/enterprise/enterprise_policy/charter/charter2005_base.htm ).