realisation of a great political and economic dream, and the national bank of belgium is proud to have contributed to it, both in planning the arrangements at european level and in ensuring that our country satisfied the conditions for membership. it was vital that belgium should meet the convergence criteria : the fact that it succeeded is, of course, due primarily to the effort made by its people, but also to the pursuit of an appropriate economic, fiscal and monetary policy in which the central bank lent its assistance together with the political authorities. we have also been successful in preparing with the sectors concerned for the introducion of cashless transactions in euros. there has been a marked strengthening of economic growth in the euro area in general, and in belgium in particular, over the past year. business and consumer confidence has now reached record levels. of course, the euro cannot take all the credit for this welcome change of climate. the international environment has also improved. but the introduction of the euro has contributed to this revival of growth by giving the area a stable internal environment, by irrevocably fixing the mutual parities of eleven currencies, damping down inflation and curbing budget deficits. and the fact that growth is strong, confidence buoyant and inflation low, also proves to my mind that the monetary policy of the new eurosystem has not been inadapted. the appreciable gain in stability brought about by the euro was particularly evident in belgium. you will recall that in the middle of last year our country was the victim of a localised or asymmetric economic shock : the dioxin crisis. as i have already said, it is thanks to the euro that the macroeconomic cost of that crisis was very small. without the introduction of the single currency, it is highly probable that the exchange rate of the belgian franc and the level of interest rates in our country would have come under pressure. the consequences of that crisis would have extended far beyond the boundaries of the sectors directly concerned. here in belgium, our motto is : strength in unity. at the national bank of belgium, we are certainly not nostalgic for a monetary sovereignty which in any case had become largely illusory for highly integrated small and medium - sized economies. the switch to a single monetary policy, decided by the governing council of the european central bank, did not mean any loss of monetary power for belgium : on the contrary, since the government and the bank had decided ten years ago

ensure the sustainability of the social security systems. the challenges are known and the analyses are completed. now the implementation should be focused on. as i have said at the beginning of my speech, i am neither a eurosceptic nor a europessimist. so i believe europe can implement the lisbon agenda. the introduction of the euro was a splendid example of a not easy but successful structural reform. it can be and it should be followed by others. the framework through which the lisbon agenda is implemented relies largely on a peer pressure mechanism, mainly depending on goodwill of governments in individual eu countries. the pressure must be reinforced, including by clearly identifying and publicising successful and lagging country cases accross the eu and possibly industrialised countries more generally. communication must also be improved. the transition from the pre - reform to the post - reform equilibrium conditions normally takes time and we must recognise that within this period some uncertainty may occur. for this reason the implementation of social reforms requires a strong leadership and a continuous explanation effort. we have to convince our public opinion that our countries would be better off - with more growth and more jobs - if we could deliver the reforms of the lisbon agenda. i shall conclude with a last remark : the current recovery of economic activity, as welcome as it is, must surely not constitute a pretext for postponing a program of reforms, as its implementation is essential to achieve stronger and more sustainable growth in the long term.