central banks of the euro area, take a keen interest in developments in candidate countries. only last month, we continued the high - level policy dialogue with our central bank colleagues from the accession countries at a seminar in vienna. through such contacts we seek to build up close and intense professional working relations, which also includes offering technical assistance. in this way, we aim to contribute to developing a vision of the " greater europe " specifically within the field of central banking. such an understanding of the significance of the euro for europe as a whole is essential, not least since many countries in central, eastern and southern europe have decided to use the euro as a reference currency for their own monetary and exchange rate policies, as an anchor of stability and credibility. this applies not only to the group of accession countries, but may increasingly also be the case for countries further afield. i expect this international role of the euro to grow in the years to come, not least since euro banknotes and coins - once they have come into circulation in 2002 - will effectively replace the deutsche mark, which is widely used in the countries concerned as a means of payment and a store of value. mr. president, ladies and gentlemen, the unification of europe has been, and continues to be, a " work in progress ". the introduction of the euro and the establishment of the european central bank form an intrinsic part of this constant evolution. in fact, the dynamics inherent in economic and monetary union suggest that the euro might become a powerful catalyst for further integration. our job at the ecb is to contribute to making the euro a lasting success. in this way the euro will bring benefits to an enlarged eu and beyond. thank you very much.

rising incomes from employment. meanwhile, on the supply - side of the economy, there is little evidence as yet in the productivity data that would suggest an acceleration in the underlying rate of capacity output growth such as we have seen in the us, and which, while it lasted, would allow the economy to grow correspondingly faster without necessarily generating inflationary pressure. we might all fervently hope to become infected by that particular disease - but the actual evidence so far suggests that up to now we have remained immune. that does not necessarily mean that we will not see accelerating productivity growth. but we can ’ t afford to gamble on that happening either. when people approach me with the sound - bite “ give growth a chance ”, what i hear them saying is “ take a risk with inflation ”. but equally when they say “ you must take no risks with inflation ”, i hear them saying “ the world will never change ”. the truth is that nobody knows with any great confidence. the important thing is to keep an open mind and to monitor intensively all of the data as they becomes available to us, and then draw what inferences we can as to how those data affect the balance of risks around the inflation target looking ahead. and that of course is precisely what we do in the monetary policy committee. our latest inflation report forecast published last week - based on constant 6 % interest rates, and on reasonable central assumptions about certain other key elements in the forecast - projects continuing overall output growth - of around 3 % initially, moderating to around 2½ % from around the end of this year - with continuing low inflation - at a rate of around 2 % this year but rising back to around the 2½ % target in the course of next year, with the risks - on these assumptions - modestly on the upside. but, given the current uncertainties, individual members of the committee quite naturally prefer their own alternative assumptions about some of the key variables - most notably the likely future path of the exchange rate and the size and duration of the effect of the downward pressure on margins. and these varying assumptions could either raise or lower the rate of inflation two years ahead by up to ½ percentage point. that, mr chairman, is all fairly technical stuff. the point to hold on to is that, on a reasonable range of assumptions, the prospect for the economy as a whole over the next couple of years is for continuing steady growth with low inflation, and most of us would happily settle for that