I am very pleased to have been invited to address you today, because this is a subject in which I am very interested and which is of great importance for the future economic development and growth of Europe as a whole. As a graduate engineer, I have some personal experience of the process which we are discussing today, but I must make it clear that I have no responsibility for education policies within the Commission's services, and therefore any comments that I make represent the personal view of an official whose prime concern is the stimulation of the rhythm of industrial innovation throughout the European Community. In choosing as the subject of this conference the education of the engineer in and for his society, I believe that you are showing a healthy concern to get things right in the future. So we first have to see what kind of society this will be.