According to an A.T. Kearney study, the global information industry is today a $2.9 trillion market and, by 2002, will be $5.4 trillion. Speaking at the seminar, Francisco Pinto Balsemão said: "Information and communication is no doubt THE issue these days and in the future. We have to find out what will be the part for publishers in that future.

"The traditional information technology spend — hardware, software, communication, services and retained IT — is estimated at about $1.5 trillion and will be a $2.4 trillion industry by 2002. Virtual environments are growing at 117 per cent each year and will be a $36 billion market in 2002.

The market for data warehouse/mining is an emerging market estimated at $1.8 billion now, growing at over 80 per cent per year. It will be a $65-70 billion market in 2002. Balsemão said: "I believe the press is not finished, old or even tired. Our activity as it is now, is profitable, is necessary, is up-to-date. And it is powerful. The press and those who make it are a fundamental part of society and indispensable for political dialogue and the functioning of democracy.

"New technologies have helped us to improve our paper printed products and their distribution, to lower costs to find new market opportunities. The crisis felt in recent years, namely the advertising problems that arose, had at least one merit: it made us re-think, re-examine what we do and how we do it.

"Take advantage of the electronic interactive media to measure and fulfil the needs of individual consumers. There is no doubt that we, as publishes and media professionals, are the main creators and providers of information and we must assume ourselves as such. Unfortunately, it is not always true for the political side.

"Some of the uncertainties publishers still have to face include: the dynamics of convergence; copyright; access and standardisation; adapting journalism and advertising to electronic publishing; and globalisation.Publishers need freedom to invest in all sectors of the information industry. Any artificial barriers between these sectors, through special limitations to ownership, will stop the development of an integrated information industry in Europe and benefit countries like the US where concentration, strength and success are not a problem and only the abuse is punished.

The second uncertainty is copyright. It is essential that publishers obtain a complete protection against unauthorised use of our information. But magazines also need more complete control over content. Today copyright is perhaps more valuable than ever, but what is happening in Europe is terrible difficulties in managing copyright. Publishers need to rethink this system and to simplify the management of those rights.

"The US system of copyright is simpler and cheaper than the European (and I don’t think US creators are unprotected or underpaid). Bill Gates of Microsoft is buying copyright extensively and creating a gigantic library," he said.

"Who do you think will benefit from the mess of the continental system of copyright? What content do you think will be most used?

"The question of access is also a major one. In the audio-visual sector there are the uncertainties of standardisation as different standards for compression and encoding of digital television will fragment the market and undermine development."The present Internet consumer — or their attitude — has more in common with the typical traditional press consumer than with TV viewers," said Balsemão.

Publishers have the contents and the tools to create new products, more individualised, more on-demand. They can easily interface and interact paper printed press with electronic press. They can respond to specific needs of readers, those that might want to have access to more detailed information. They have files and archives and can organise them in such a way that all customer needs can be fulfiled.

"We need to put the emphasis on quality, both in journalism and in advertising," he said.Globalisation is the last uncertainty on the list and should be split in two. We are facing both economical globalisation and cultural globalisation. But we have to find out what it really means.

He continued: "On an economical basis, what we see is the end of protectionism, the new role of the World Trade Organization (WTO) that led, for example, to the agreement on telecommunications liberalisation early this year. "What we see is the dependence of all our economies, recently portrayed in the worldwide wave of stock market crises. What we see are the results of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the expansion of democratic and free market values. "But we have to be conscious that this is true only for part of the world.

Globalisation is happening among industrialised, developed countries. In Africa or the Middle East they are not as certain of globalisation as we seem to be."The gap between rich and poor is real and is becoming also a gap between the info-rich and the info-poor. According to a United Nations study, 97 per cent of all Internet sites are created in developed countries, in countries where only 15 per cent of the world’s population lives.Even in rich societies not everyone is able to access new media, either because of economical or educational difficulties. Competitiveness is not everything. Social and cultural values cannot be put aside and cannot be replaced by global culture. Global culture in itself is not difficult to apprehend. On a cultural basis, globalisation depends on average culture, average language and average needs that we can all understand.

The expansion of the media (not only the new technologies) is creating a global culture, but it may also become merely an artificial culture, a "3 minute culture", or "fast-food" culture as some would call it. The question is who will want more than that? And who will be able to get more than that?To overcome the dangers of uniformisation and of superficiality, to transfer the information society into a learning society, the role of the publisher and their media, print and electronic, is fundamental.Concluding, Balsemão said: "I made the tour of some difficulties we are facing and I have suggested some solutions. I am sure that your debate will contribute to broaden and deepen the study of "the new challenges and opportunities for the publishing industry".

"The ultimate question is: are we going to allow others, newcomers, to do it? Or are we going to do it ourselves, sharing our growing media market with the new types of media?"

My answer is: yes, we are going to do it ourselves."