Ladies and Gentlemen,

This was the 11th annual conference organized by the Department of Finance and Accounting of the Faculty of Economics at Matej Bel University in Banska Bystrica in cooperation with the Representation of the European Commission in Slovakia and its Head Mr. Dusan Chrenek, whose sincere thanks we give for this successful joint project. Also involved are the Regional European Information Center in Banska Bystrica and we acknowledge the support of a project financed by the Slovak Research and Development Agency. Again we give both these organisations our sincere thanks. The conferences have left a significant footprint particularly, but not only, on both the Faculty and the Department. We are pleased that the intention to create a top-level political and expert platform for communicating views on evolving EU issues has been successful. It has facilitated discussion between academics and non-academic institutions.

We were very pleased to welcome to the conference our distinguished institutional guests and eminent keynote speakers from Slovakia and from the Czech Republic who came to Banska Bystrica to share their opinion on the current issues of the economic and monetary policy in the EU and actively contributed to the success of our special scientific event: Mr. Vladimir Hiadlovsky – Rector of Matej Bel University in Banska Bystrica, Mr. Peter Kristofik – Dean of the Faculty of Economics at Matej Bel University in Banska Bystrica, Mr. Dusan Chrenek – Head of the EC Representation in Slovakia, Mrs. Anetta Caplanova – Member of the Council for Budget Responsibility of the SR, Mrs. Alena Longauerova – Director of Assey Office of the SR, Mr. Viliam Palenik - The Institute of Economic Research of Slovak Academy of Sciences and Mr. David Spacek - The Faculty of Economics and Administration at Masaryk University in Brno.

We were particularly pleased to welcome to the conference also Prof. Pavol Ochotnicky with his research team - our colleagues and friends from the Faculty of National Economy, University of Economics in Bratislava and the Faculty of Management at Presov University who were involved in discussing competitiveness, economic growth and business survival in a European context, within the framework of the scientific project „Competitivness, economic growth and firms survival“, supported by the Slovak Research and Development Agency.

The main topic of this year´s conference was „Economic and Monetary Policy in the Context of the Contemporary Development of the European Integration Processes“. This is a critical time for the EU. We face specific problems with BREXIT, but also with recent events in Spain and to a lesser extent other countries across the Union. We also face an increasingly uncertain world with respect to the other major global powers, which could have both economic and political consequences for the EU. It has been almost ten years since the beginning of the crisis and we are still dealing with the consequences. Thus both the ECB and other central banks are still following unconventional monetary policies with low interest rates and quantitative easing. Although there are some signs of economic recovery and economic growth, many in the Union still suffer from economic difficulties. Economic growth is crucial to our success. The EU's recovery towards economic prosperity must be based on competitiveness, innovation, business survival and success. But it must be sustainable growth and growth that brings benefits to all of us, to every country and the citizens of the entire European Union. Economic and monetary policy plays a crucial role in ensuring this success. Monetary policies should return to some standard form with higher interest rates, a healthy bond market, and a healthy banking sector over the next decade. Although there must be doubts as to the extent this will happen. These are also the most important issues that we discussed at this year’s conference.

Finally, we give our sincere thanks to all participants, to all our guests, colleagues, friends and students who, with their active attitudes, contributed to our conference and the fruitful and valuable discussion, thus making it a great success. We are looking forward to warmly welcoming you to the next annual conference in November 2018.

Prof. Ing. Marta Orviska, PhD.
Chairperson of the Scientific Board