ESBA - The Independant Voice for Small Business

ESBA RELEASES ITS NEW ‘ESBA ACTIVITIES 2006-2007’ PUBLICATION

Brussels, October 23rd 2006

The European Small Business Alliance (ESBA) has recently released its new ‘ESBA Activities 2006-2007: The Way Forward For Small Businesses in Europe’ publication at the European Union level.

This annual ESBA publication represents an innovative approach to communication for business organisations as it combines reflection on past activities with the presentation of future objectives.

Established in 1998, ESBA is one of the most recent European small business organisations to operate in Brussels. It differs from sometimes-older SME organisations, in that ESBA only represents fully independent small business advocacy and benefits organisations (mostly cross-sector, but also sector based), which are based on free membership. ESBA’s members do not comprise statutory membership groups.

Commenting on the release of the publication, ESBA President, Tina Sommer said, “ESBA is keen to make a contribution to one of the most important objectives of the Feira Charter for small businesses by seeking to improve the representation of SMEs in Europe. We are committed to making sure that independent, free membership SME organisations have access to EU dialogues shaping the business environment in the Union, which is on a par with other types of organisations in Brussels.”

Although relatively unknown by EU Officials, the views of SMEs expressed by independent organisations and statutory membership groups can sometimes be different, if not contradictory. Distinctions exist, for instance, on issues such as the license to trade, access to professions, tax harmonization and the use of public funding for enterprise policy in Europe. On all these and others, ESBA has and will continue to engage in open dialogue with EU policy-makers and all business stakeholders.

“The new ESBA publication, which is the first in what we intend to be a long, annual series, will seek to demonstrate that our objective is first and foremost to strive for results,” Tina Sommer added. “Recognition is not an end in its self, but hopefully it will be a consequence of the achievements we make on behalf of our members and SMEs.”

An electronic version of the new ‘ESBA Activities 2006-2007’ publication is now available on the ESBA website at www.esba-europe.org. Hard copies can be ordered from the Brussels Office at the address below.

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Note to the editor:

ESBA is a non-party political European group, which gathers member organisations from 22 European countries. It currently represents over 1.5 million small business entrepreneurs and is one of the largest organisations based on voluntary (vs. statutory) membership in Europe. ESBA cares for small business entrepreneurs and the self-employed and represents them through targeted EU advocacy activities. It also works towards the development of strong independent advocacy and benefits groups in European countries. For more information, please contact: secretariat@esba-europe.org

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Page last updated: 02/11/2006 11:05:23 AM