No. 12 (234) / 2015 Polish Market

PU B LISHED SIncE 199 6 No. 12 (234) /2015 :: www.polishmarket.com.pl

HONORARY PEARLS THE PEARLS OF THE

POLISH ECONOMY PEARLS OF

INNOVATION Michał S o ł o w o w The winner of The honorary Pearl 2015 in The economy caTegory

Economy

From The Government Information Centre

52 56

Polish Economy in 2015 Anna Stasiak-Apelska, director of the Warsaw office of the Gajewski Trawczyńska i Wspólnicy law firm: Right to withdraw from distance contracts

Beata Szydło presents the policy of her government

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Anna Streżyńska, Minister of Digitisation: Broadband networks an important nerve of everyday life Prof. Elżbieta Mączyńska, President of the Polish Economic Society, head of the Department of Financial Management in Enterprises at Warsaw School of Economics, member of the National Development Council: National Development Council, There is no economic recovery without investment 13th Pearls of the Polish Economy Gala Michał Sołowow - a visionary is looking forward Grzegorz Stulgis, President of the Supervisory Board of Alumetal SA: Pearl of the Polish Economy motivation for further work The Port of Gdynia to prepare for ocean going mega containerships Piotr Mirosław, President and Managing Director of Lyreco Polska SA: We make daily work easier Tomasz Szadkowski, President of Soflab Technology Sp. z o.o.: Our service quality has been appreciated The north versus the south The science-business Cooperation Wielkopolska Centre for Advanced Technologies Bridge between science and industry

58 Infrastructure

Our Guest

Pearls of the Polish Economy

Innovation

14 38 42 43 44 46 48 50 51

From The President’s Press Office

60 62 63

64 66 67 68 69 70

Economy

CONTENTS 6 7 8 10 12

Sylwia Mikołajczyk, President of Petrax Sp. z o.o.: 2015 a time of intensive search for new markets and business opportunities Prof. Małgorzata Zaleska, Director of the Institute of Banking, Warsaw School of Economics (SGH), President of the Committee on Financial Sciences, Polish Academy of Sciences (PAN): A year of change in the Polish banking sector Breaking down barriers to the development of Polish infrastructure Transportation - the current state and prospects for development We’re taking the future into our own hands NEWAG, a company-member of the Southern Railway Cluster, is the winner of the European edition of ERCI Innovation Awards 2015 14th Congress of Polish Exporters Horus-Energia A Consistent Development Ewa Małyszko, President of PKO BP BANKOWY PTE: Save for the future, get a Christmas gift now Responsible business awards have been presented Magdalena Majchrzak-Puczyńska, Managing Director of Molton: Molton from Poland

84 85 86 89

Cultural Monitor Maciej Proliński: Opera on TV and computer screens Maciej Proliński: Beauty of a tale, beauty of an image Jolanta Pawlik, pianist, manager and producer, co-owner of Pawlik Relations Concert Agency: I think that Poles are happy with us...

Watch out! A talent on the horizon A better world of Lubomir Tomaszewski 110 years of Dom Technika in Warsaw Miłosz Jankowiak, Project Director of Polagra Food: Selling the potential of the Polish food industry Goplana & Solidarność the kingdom of chocolates and pralines “Meat from Poland” at Polagra Economic Monitor

Cover: Michał Sołowow / Photo: Łukasz Giersz Photos on issue: www.shutterstock.com

12/2015

CONTENTS

Culture Food Industry

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Editorial

DID LAST YEAR’S PREDICTIONS PROVE TRUE?

T

his year’s Gala of the Pearls of the Polish Economy is now history. On 6 November, the Royal Castle in Warsaw saw “Polish Market” celebrate some very important jubilees: for the tenth time prominent Poles were honoured for their achievements in the fields of science, economy, culture and promotion of social and patriotic values; for the thirteenth time results were announced of our survey listing the most effective and dynamic Polish companies; for the fifth time the PROGRESS statuettes were awarded for innovative projects.

I would like to extend my warm thanks to all our Guests, as well as to the Winners of the previous editions who were so many to attend the Gala of the Pearls of the Polish Economy. Thank you for having joined with us to celebrate the Jubilee of the Honorary Pearls. It is also my pleasure to express my gratitude to our wonderful Jury for 10 years of extremely challenging work.

December is a time of contemplation and drawing lessons. What was the year 2015 like? It started rather optimistically. But it could hardly be different as all the indications were that we managed to overcome the third wave of the global crisis and – as the Europe’s only country – to get boldly – albeit verging on a recession – back on growth track.

Did last year’s predictions prove true? Let’s recall. The most popular “neutral” scenario assumed a GDP growth of 3.5%, with an increase in consumption and a smaller-than-formerly role of exports and investment. Another jump in exports is not expected given the protracted destabilisation beyond our eastern border, Greece’s sovereign debt crisis, hardly controllable deflation in the “old” EU countries and China’s slowdown painfully affecting the global economy. As regards private investment, after a record 16% growth last year, it was unrealistic to expect such a surge again in 2015, while in the public sector, a gap in the inflow of EU funds had to be reckoned with. Despite these reservations, there were forecasts suggesting a 5-5.5% salary increase and a job growth bringing the unemployment rate to single-digit levels.

Our optimism was further strengthened by analyses pointing to sustainable macro-proportions of our economy, by an outstanding and internationally-acknowledged stability of our banking system, and by a predictable political situation. The latter was considered the primary asset placing Poland ever higher in the ratings by the global credit rating agencies.

Which of these predictions did come true? Macroeconomic indicators will be achieved. The fact is particularly important of maintaining - despite deflation - an over 4% growth in retail sales, an over 4% salary increase and a decrease in unemployment rate to 9.3% (7.2% according to EU methodology). These results were attained in a still unstable international environment – China’s slowdown, ailing India’s and Brazil’s economies, not to mention Russia and its embargoes on Polish products. Not without significance was the growth of the German economy, which rose by 1.8% in the fourth quarter (to its highest levels since the beginning of 2014). As a result, sales was growing faster in export sectors (automobiles, chemicals, furniture, plastics, electronic goods).

Business investment was running up at a pace no less than 6%. Companies were investing in upgrading their assets rather than expanding them. It would be good news, because technically and technologically revamped infrastructure is a source of progress.

But back to the evaluation of the ending year, what remains an indisputable achievement of Polish public finance system is preventing a further growth in the public debt levels, acknowledged by the European Commission’s decision to release Poland from the excessive deficit procedure, imposing specific limitations on governments and budgets. What next? What will 2016 be like? The presidential and parliamentary elections has thoroughly changed the political landscape in Poland, with the winning party having announced a far-reaching social and economic reconstruction. It will take a while before the assessment of the new policies and the actual scope of the changes can be done. I must admit that it will be a special year for me as the founder of “Polish Market” – the magazine will celebrate its 20th anniversary in 2016. I am extremely proud that “Polish Market” shows positive examples, the values ​​which form the basis of a strong society and which are the foundation of a modern economy. Personally, I wish the new Polish government every success. I hope it will live up to difficult tasks it faces, particularly in the area of economic ​​ freedom, innovation development and brand building. I wish it to myself and to you, Dear Readers, that the same time next year we are able to say that 2016 was a good year.

Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek Editor-in-Chief President of Rynek Polski Publishers Co. Ltd. 12/2015 polish market

5

President

President Andrzej Duda on a visit to China

P

articipation in the Central and Eastern Europe-China Economic Forum as well as meetings with China’s highest officials were the focal points of the visit of President Andrzej Duda to China.

The President took part in the “16 + 1” Forum, which brings together delegates from Central and Eastern European countries with those from China in Suzhou, one of the fastest growing cities in the world. While there, Andrzej Duda also met with China’s Prime Minister Li Keqiang. Back in Beijing President Duda met with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping and Chairman of the Standing Committee of China’s National People’s Congress (NPC) Zhang Dejiang.

“We are going to China to build new roads and bridges of cooperation, mainly economic, between Central Europe and China,” presidential minister Krzysztof Szczerski said in an interview with reporters before the visit. He added that Poland intended to play a major role in this process. “Despite a difference of potentials and a huge geographical distance, Poland and China are both actors of the same global economy,” Minister Szczerski stressed.

“Central Europe: unity in diversity” was President Duda’s message for the participants of the Economic Forum “16 + 1”. Krzysztof Szczerski pointed out that each of the CEE countries had its own, sometimes

competing interests with Asian countries. At the same time, he added that President Duda promoted investment cooperation in the CEE region leading to greater consistency.

The Polish President was accompanied by Deputy Ministers of the Economy and Foreign Affairs; other CEE countries were represented by Prime Ministers.

Minister Szczerski stressed that the concept of infrastructure investments as part of the initiative “One Belt and One Road” requires political decisions from Poland and China. He informed that a relevant memorandum would be signed in Beijing. The project “One Belt, One Road” provides for the construction and modernisation of the land and sea links between the EU and China. Part of the “New Silk Road” is a cargo rail line linking the cities of Łódź and Chengdu.

“Another big investment project, namely the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), requires political decisions, too,” he added. This is a new Chinese initiative, which is to be an alternative to US-dominated international financial institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund and a driver of infrastructure investment and economic development in China.

Talks on Polish-French relations and the Weimar Triangle in Paris

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resident Andrzej Duda met in Paris with French President François Hollande. The talks focused on Polish-French relations, including within the Weimar Triangle, and the upcoming COP21 climate summit, as well as the Mińsk agreements and sustainable peace in Ukraine. The Presidents also discussed the conflict in Syria.

“President Duda and I attach great importance to the Weimar Triangle (France, Poland, Germany). Yesterday I met with Chancellor Angela Merkel and told her about today’s meeting. We decided to organise a meeting of the Weimar Triangle (Poland, France, Germany) in the first half of next year, before the July NATO summit in Warsaw,” said President Hollande.

Another topic discussed was the upcoming climate summit in Paris. “My position is that this issue should always be considered taking into account the interests of individual EU countries and our European energy potential in a broad sense. We should do our best to use that potential as well as possible, including investing in science, research and new

technologies in order to protect the climate also in this way, using the energy resources we have,” President Duda said.

The two Presidents also talked about culture, youth exchanges and economic relations. “Today, France is one of Poland’s absolutely biggest (economic) partners, but things can always be better, the climate can always be more favourable”, President Duda pointed out.

President in Bucharest: We showed unity and decisiveness

A

ndrzej Duda took part in a meeting of the heads of the NATO eastern flank’s states in Bucharest. The talks ended with the adoption of a joint declaration in anticipation of the NATO summit in Warsaw in June 2016. In the declaration the leaders of the eastern flank’s states expressed their deep concern over the continuing aggressive attitude of Russia, stressing that the country must re-enter the path of compliance with international law.

“Russia’s aggressive actions in Ukraine, including the illegal and illegitimate annexation of the Crimea, support for separatists in Ukraine, and military presence in our neighborhood, undermine the European security architecture,” wrote the signatories to the declaration.

“We showed unity, we showed our capacity for decisions and we made a significant contribution to future decisions which will be taken during the NATO summit in Warsaw. I am really glad to say this, especially as the co-host together with the Romanian President and also as the host of next year’s summit of the alliance in Warsaw. I am convinced that the Warsaw summit will take decisions and that NATO as a whole will show unity and determination, and above all that it will show that it is alive,” the Polish president said.

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The Bucharest meeting was held on the initiative of Andrzej Duda and his Romanian counterpart Klaus Iohannis. It was also attended by NATO’s Deputy Secretary General Alexander Vershbow, as well as Presidents of Bulgaria Rosen Plevnelev, of Estonia Toomas Hendrik Ilves, of Latvia Raimonds Vejonis, of Lithuania Dalia Grybauskaite, of Slovakia Andrej Kiska, of Hungary Janos Ader, and Jan Hamacek, Speaker of the Czech Republic’s Chamber of Deputies.

Prime Minister

ON 13 NOVEMBER 2015 PRESIDENT ANDRZEJ DUDA DESIGNATED LAW AND JUSTICE’S (PIS) BEATA SZYDŁO AS PRIME MINISTER OF POLAND

“

Thank for the trust placed in me. I want to thank all the Poles who gave me their trust by voting in the elections. I will do everything not to disappoint Poles,” Beata Szydło said on receiving the nomination.

“Our motto will be hard work and humility. I strongly believe that all members of my government will have such an understanding of their duties,” she stressed.

“Matters of our country, matters of Poles will always be of primary importance for us,” she added.

THE FOLLOWING IS THE LINE-UP OF THE NEW POLISH GOVERNMENT: > MATEUSZ MORAWIECKI

> ANDRZEJ ADAMCZYK

DEPUTY PM AND DEVELOPMENT MINISTER

INFRASTRUCTURE AND CONSTRUCTION MINISTER

> PIOTR GLIŃSKI

> KONSTANTY RADZIWIŁŁ

DEPUTY PM AND CULTURE MINISTER

HEALTH MINISTER

> JAROSŁAW GOWIN

> MAREK GRÓBARCZYK

DEPUTY PM AND SCIENCE AND HIGHER EDUCATION MINISTER

MARITIME ECONOMY AND INLAND WATERWAYS MINISTER

> MARIUSZ BŁASZCZAK

> ANNA STREŻYŃSKA

INTERIOR AND ADMINISTRATION MINISTER

DIGITISATION MINISTER

> ANTONI MACIEREWICZ

> WITOLD BAŃKA

DEFENCE MINISTER

SPORTS MINISTER

> WITOLD WASZCZYKOWSKI

> BEATA KEMPA

FOREIGN AFFAIRS MINISTER

MINISTER, MEMBER OF THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS,

> PAWEŁ SZAŁAMACHA

HEAD OF PM’S OFFICE

FINANCE MINISTER

> ELŻBIETA WITEK

> ZBIGNIEW ZIOBRO

MINISTER, MEMBER OF THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS,

JUSTICE MINISTER

GOVERNMENT’S SPOKESPERSON

> DAWID JACKIEWICZ

> HENRYK KOWALCZYK

TREASURY MINISTER

MEMBER OF THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS,

> ANNA ZALEWSKA - EDUCATION MINISTER > JAN SZYSZKO

> MARIUSZ KAMIŃSKI

ENVIRONMENT MINISTER

MINISTER, MEMBER OF THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS,

> ELŻBIETA RAFALSKA

COORDINATOR OF INTELLIGENCE SERVICES

LABOUR MINISTER

> KRZYSZTOF TCHÓRZEWSKI

> KRZYSZTOF JURGIEL

MEMBER OF THE COUNCIL OF MINISTERS (ENTRUSTED WITH

AGRICULTURE MINISTER

THE MISSION OF STRUCTURING THE FUTURE ENERGY MINISTRY)

CHAIR OF THE GOVERNMENT STANDING COMMITTEE

12/2015 polish market

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Our Guest

BEATA SZYDŁO

PRESENTS THE POLICY OF HER GOVERNMENT

I

am assuming the office of Poland’s prime minister at a time when our world, build on the values of freedom, democracy and tolerance, is being attacked increasingly aggressively by those who do not respect others’ right to freedom. We do not agree to this vision of the world. Today, Polish people, just like other Europeans, want security. This is why we will be cooperating loyally with European countries in the fight against terrorism. At the same time, our priority will be to ensure security for the citizens of our country.

I can summarize the programme of our government in a single sentence – firstly, development, secondly, development and thirdly, development.

We have to respond to the challenges of the future. We have to break out of the middle-income trap, find solutions to all the problems Poland is facing in the sphere of the economy, social affairs and the condition of the state.

Firstly, [an allowance of-ed.] PLN500 per child starting with the second child and, in families on lower incomes, starting with the first child. A child is not a cost, but an investment. Secondly, lowering the age of retirement to 60 for women and 65 for men. Thirdly, raising the level of non-taxable income to PLN8,000. Fourthly, free medicines for people aged 75 and over. Fifthly, increasing the minimum rate of pay per hour to PLN12.

The development of the country is our government’s priority for its full four-year term.

We have to break out of the middle-income trap, raise the economy onto a new level where growth is based on investment and innovation rather than cheap labour force. To this end, we

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have to use all the spare resources at our disposal. The first resource is the enterprise of Polish people – those who already operate in the economy and conduct independent business activity, and those who, at least potentially, can undertake such activity.

Both entrepreneurs and prospective entrepreneurs are encountering today very serious obstacles: a shortage of their own capital, poor credit standing, bureaucratic barriers and, finally, distortions to the pure rules of the market play.

We will introduce clear public procurement rules. We will lower taxes for small enterprises. The corporate income tax for small firms will be reduced to 15%. What we want first of all is to support small and medium businesses. The large ones usually manage much better, but we will be removing the obstacles they face as well. Poland needs the enterprise of young and excellently educated Poles. We have to exploit their creativity, which is well known in the world and admired, and their openness to new ideas. Thanks to the young Poles, we will develop an economy based on knowledge and innovation. It is also very important to create opportunities for medium-sized businesses, which have an especially great power when it comes to innovation.

The intellectual potential of Polish people can be used better. Science has to work closely with business. The National Forum of Entrepreneurs, which we are going to set up and attach to the prime minister, will be helpful in this respect. We also have to create a scientific research base for small and medium

enterprises. Vocational schools have to correspond with the real needs of the labour market.

An important element of our pro-family undertakings, which will also contribute to increasing the number of jobs, is our housing programme. It is about building cheap homes on plots to be made available for a nominal fee by the state and its various institutions. The apartments built in this way will be financed by bank loans – which I want to stress because we do not want money from the national budget to be used – and will be rented out. The rent will include a long-term repayment of the loan, which will be equivalent to a gradual buy-back of the apartment.

The continuation of the programme to expand the kindergarten chain, started by our predecessors, will also serve as an incentive for young Poles to start a family and have children. Our goal is for the kindergartens to be free, at least for families on the lowest, middle and slightly-higher-than-middle income.

A priority task for the finance minister will be to prepare an amendment to the 2016 budget bill so as to put into practice one of the most important items of the programme, that is the pro-family policy known as PLN500 for the second and subsequent child, and in poorer families for the first and subsequent child.

To achieve this, sectoral taxes on banks and supermarkets will be imposed, the collection of dividends will be raised by PLN1 billion, the deficit will be widened by PLN1-1.5 billion and the collection of VAT will be improved. I am mentioning this to show that there is a room for manoeuvre, enabling us

Our Guest to carry out our plans within the framework of next year’s budget.

At the same time, the Ministry of Finance will begin work on systemic changes: reforming the tax administration and providing it with modern IT tools, making it possible to limit the extent of VAT evasion, and ensure a more effective collection of excise tax and CIT from large corporations. It is impossible to balance public finances and reduce the debt-toGDP ratio for the long term without boosting tax revenue. Our own domestic tax revenue of appropriate scale enables investment supporting economic growth and a rise in wages.

Another great challenge we are facing is also schooling and issues concerning higher education. In the context of schooling and the problem of Polish families, one should say something about compulsory schooling for six-year-olds introduced against parents’ will.

It will be the parents to decide whether their child goes to school at the age of six or seven.

The changes will also involve the school education system. We will gradually return to an eight-year primary school and a four-year secondary school.

Vocational schools are another extremely important issue when it comes to education. We have to adjust vocational education to the needs of the market and the economy.

We have to cooperate in this area with businesses, we have to rebuild Polish vocational education and we will do so. Poland’s experience, but also the experience of other European countries, shows that vocational education is needed at both secondary and higher level.

We will be taking care of its development. In this way, we will be able to support the development of the economy, but also reduce the risk of unemployment among the young. And this is a very serious problem today. Knowledge and attitude is what the school should shape. A strong sense of national identity and patriotism should be an element of this attitude. High requirements in terms of education and upbringing, and a strong emphasis on shaping awareness is a road to success in both individual and national dimension. We have to return to the full teaching of history and the classical canon of required reading.

The state is not only an organization, but also a moral quality and this has to be taken into account in every real and large-scale project designed to repair it. We have to make our state an object of Polish pride again, just as it once was. I mean the whole education and cultural policy. It has to contribute to strengthening patriotic attitudes. It has to broadly exploit the enormous opportunities offered by culture to rebuild and build Polish memory, give it value and show the wealth of our national achievement. With the support of

public funding, works should be made which will be telling Poland and the world about our outstanding compatriots and our heroes, and will be an inspiration for further generations of Poles. Let us not be ashamed to build the ethos of Polish heroes. Let us always remember about them.

Sport is also a sphere where Poles’ social capital may be created. The successes our contestants score in many disciplines show that it is worth investing in the sporting activity of children and young people.

We propose changes to the way in which economic policy is managed. Our objective is the development of the country and the Polish economy. This is why the Ministry of Development will be central to the new management mechanism. The ministry’s main task will be to carry out our great investment plan. In the first phase, the ministry will be established by merging the Ministries of Regional Development and of the Economy. With time, it will be taking over tasks performed now by the Ministry of the Treasury, which is being liquidated. The Ministry of Infrastructure, to be split from the Ministry of Development, but strongly supplemented with the construction sector, will continue to play the managing role in the sphere of infrastructure projects. The main programme to be carried out by this ministry will be the housing programme mentioned above, alongside the construction of motorways and expressways, and the modernization of railways. Another change is establishing the Ministry of Energy.

This ministry, just like the Ministry of Infrastructure, will play a major part in carrying out the main project, but the main thing is to integrate actions and measures aimed at making a real breakthrough because the power industry will also be one of the main recipients of the big money we are going to spend on development. The decision to set up this ministry results first of all from the strategic character of the object of its activity and the huge number of problems which are to be undertaken here. Among these problems is the question of mining. The minister of energy will deal with this issue in the first place. There are concepts of how to solve this difficult problem and, in consultation with mining sector workers, we will start putting them into practice.

The establishment of the Ministry of Digitization is a result of to-date experience. The digitization of the state is indispensable. At the same time, we are not seeing any real progress in this respect and there are various measures which at least raise doubts. We will use British and American models, consolidating tasks and measures in one hand.

As regards foreign and defence policy, and the problem of the country’s security, we will

be guided by three priorities, we will have three goals. Firstly, security understood in a traditional sense, when an armed conflict, although frozen today, is being waged at our country’s borders. Secondly, economic security, especially in the sphere of energy, but also IT. And thirdly, achieving a proper status and position for the country in the international arena.

When it comes to military security, we are planning to pursue two kinds of parallel and complementary activity. On the one hand, we are going to strengthen and expand our armed forces. The considerable investment in armaments already planned should be made in such a way so as to contribute to the development of the Polish economy. On the other hand, we are going to take measures aimed at strengthening the eastern flank of NATO. The process may be slow, although we would like to speed it up. The point is that it should be unidirectional and consistent. In security matters and the whole foreign policy, we attach special importance to relations with the United States, which is today the main guarantor of peace in the world and will remain so in the foreseeable future.

Energy security means keeping Polish coal as a source of energy and measures designed to secure us gas and oil supplies in any situation, which means completing the construction of the gas terminal and its expansion, and considering the construction of a second gas terminal in the vicinity of the Tri-city. The ability to use an alternative solution when it comes to gas supplies has an impact on the prices of the raw material we receive from the East.

And the third matter when it comes to foreign policy and security – Poland will be active and assertive. We will be opposing divisions in Europe, both within the European Union and outside it. We will be striving to empower not only our policy, but also the policy of the region we belong to. We will be trying to ensure a strong position for Poland in the international arena.

In these uncertain times, we have to be together. The government of the Law and Justice is open to cooperation based on harmony and compromise. This is why I am asking you all for such harmonious cooperation. Not for us, not for our political ambitions, not for our careers, but for Polish people. Today, Polish people want cooperation and dialogue. I am convinced that together we will be able to meet the challenges that our country is facing. Let us remember, dear deputies, that we are all members of a single big white-and-red team. • (excerpts from the policy speech of Prime Minister Beata Szydło on November 18, 2015)

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Our Guest

BROADBAND NETWORKS

AN IMPORTANT NERVE OF EVERYDAY LIFE Anna Streżyńska, Minister of Digitisation

C

ertainly some you expected they will hear today about the plans of the Ministry of Digitisation. Let me refer Digital Poland, a programme prepared by myself and Krzysztof Schubert long before the elections.

This programme has not lost its relevance, and specifies the major developments we intend to accomplish. When it comes to details, I would rather avoid answering questions for now, because it is the moment for the person responsible for this area to stop talking and start looking into figures – the current state of affairs in the ministry and subordinate institutions – to be able to rely on bare facts rather than assumptions. So I am not ready yet to give you details of Digital Poland, although, as I said, its assumptions remain valid. I would also like the programme of the Minister Digitisation to be presented at a specially convened public conference.

Broadband networks are an important nerve of everyday life. For some time, our focus has been - both in private business and enterprises subsidised from the EU budget - on building them and on their development concepts. This is currently the most civilisationally creative segment of our activity. My personal

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experience in both networks is great and - for various reasons – terrible at the same time. It was there that I found out how little business rationality means in confrontation with formal and legal record - both at domestic and EU levels. I think it is that reality we have to change. Too often common sense in business conduct, attempts to combine business with subsidies yields to a range of formal requirements that delay or block the investment. The first thing that we will work on is amending the mega-law with a view to facilitating the investment process and implementing the socalled “cost perspective”, i.e. Directive 61 on broadband cost reduction. This will allow us to change the way of implementation of our tasks in the new budget period. For me, it is one of our priorities.

The second important task is the search for additional funding sources - repayable and non-repayable. I have spoken many times about the role of Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego (BGK). When I was with the Office of Electronic Communications (UKE), we strived to establish such a cooperation with BGK and with other banks. We will have to get back to this idea because the issues related to the presence of banks and pension funds in this sector were promised in the National Broadband Plan, but got stuck somewhere in vacuum and were not finalised. It is not about funding for large operators who can manage on their own. It is about funding for small players and strengthening their market situation. He also mentioned the money from the auction. Depending on what decisions regarding the auction will be taken (and they will be taken at the government level and not by the Ministry of Digitisation), should the auction be completed, we will certainly strive to partly reinvest EU funds on the telecommunications market. Whether this will work is also probably one of the questions you would like to ask me.

However, I cannot provide you an answer yet because these decisions are made at the government level and are still ahead. The money from the auction does not go to UKE, but to

the state budget from where it is distributed.

It is the Minister of Finance that decides on its allocation and, as you know, there are many purposes to serve.

I also wish to announce changes in the Operational Programme Digital Poland. They will be made without prejudice to any rights.

The changes will pertain to the first axis of the programme, namely the construction of broadband networks. These changes will come as a result of many factors depending on the Ministry of Digitisation, the European Commission and other players. I would like to keep the enthusiasm we felt when making the first investments subsidised from EU funds, and when programming the first broadband spending and negotiating an agreement with Telekomunikacja Polska. I would also like the contact between the Minister of Digitisation and the market to be more fruitful, and your demands to be reflected in joint activities of ministries that we are going to initiate. We are facing a great opportunity to build local networks and I hope that we will do it together.

I hope that this project will not be programmed exclusively by government officials, but that it will be a joint effort, maximally efficient, whose final effect will be the implementation of a public purpose. Let’s remember that we are doing this for ourselves, for our children, friends, relatives. Let’s reflect on how to organise all the available resources and tools is such a way as to use them as efficiently as possible and to ensure that the end of 2020, or perhaps taking into account possible setbacks and settlements the end of 2022, will be a satisfactory moment, a moment for us to say – here we are having accomplished what was once considered almost impossible. In building these networks, we should remember that five years in the lives of young people living in peripheral areas of the country is a significant period of time, a time that can determine their future.

• Speech given on the occasion of the 7th edition of the Broadband Network Forum on 19 November 2015

Our Guest

YWNA T A T Y R A CHA

AKCJ

i k n y Jed

CHOINKI JEDYNKI

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NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT COUNCIL

Our Guest

THERE IS NO ECONOMIC RECOVERY WITHOUT INVESTMENT

You are a member of the National Development Council, which was established as a consultative and advisory body to the President of the Republic of Poland. Created

by President Lech Kaczyński, it continues under President Andrzej Duda.

President Lech Kaczyński appointed a 48-person National Development Council (NRR) in 2010. It was a pluralistic body. Unfortunately, only two sittings were held: one on demographics and the other on public finances. After the presidential plane crash, which occurred in Smoleńsk on 10 April 2010, killing 96 people including President Lech Kaczyński, the National Development Council ceased to function. However, the results of its work were published in 2010 by the Office of the President of the Republic of Poland in the form of two reports: 1. “Demographic problems of poland and their economic consequences. a report from the first sitting of the national development council”; 2. “Polish public finances – the current state and prospects. a raport from the second sitting of the national development council.” 1 In office since August 2015, President Andrzej Duda - according to what had been promised in the election campaign - returned to the concept of the National Development Council and appointed it in October 2015, maintaining its pluralistic nature. Its members represent different views, different economic currents and different professions. They are scientists and experts, but also practitioners: economists, lawyers, engineers, doctors, architects, social activists and journalists.

The National Development Council consists of 87 people (so it is more numerous than the previous one) and is organised into 10 thematic sections. Both plenary sessions and specific debates are held within these sections.

PM

Prof. Elżbieta Mączyńska, President of the Polish Economic Society, head of the Department of Financial Management in Enterprises at Warsaw School of Economics, member of the National Development Council, talks to Ewelina JanczylikForyś.

What issues will be addressed by the Council?

The first plenary sitting of the Council pertained to health; the other, preceded by an expert’s debate, was devoted to climate protection. The Council will certainly deal with the fundamental strategic issues. It will focus on the strategic development risks and ways to counteract them. It is no coincidence that the previous Council tackled demographics and public finances, as these are the most challenging issues of strategic importance these days. Unfortunately, since the beginning of political transformation, demographic problems have PM

1 Both reports, with a preface in English, are available online: ftp://e-samorzadowiec.pl/tom%201%20v%2010_10.pdf: http://pub. katalogsamorzadowy.home.pl/pub/2%20tom/nrr_t2_10_10_cz1.pdf.

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continually been neglected; we lacked a strategic approach, which now has serious repercussions. The Government Population Council forecasts that by 2050 the population of Poland will shrink by approx. 4.5 million, or even by 5 million, according to the UN projections. This is a huge gap. It is important to take countermeasures. The demise of President Lech Kaczyński and the ensuing interruption in the functioning of the Council meant that the discussion was discontinued.

The general weakness of the social and economic policy in Poland is that a strategic, long-term approach to it is still missing. In addition to the National Development Council, we need in Poland a national centre for strategic studies, one we still do not have. It is characteristic about the economy that each of its areas allows different solutions, and each of them means different expenditure as well as different immediate and long-term consequences. The choice is up to the government. But the government should make it based on the results of strategic analyses, transversal comparative analyses. Such analyses determine accuracy of decisions and choices when it comes to social and economic priorities. The National Development Council is a platform meant to encourage strategic thinking in social and economic policy and identify desirable long-term social and economic guidelines, major threats and suggest optimal solutions. But decision-making as to these solutions is the domain of the government.

As you said, the National Development Council is made up of eminent personalities from various backgrounds - researchers, business people, members of community organisations, etc. Given differences of opinion, will it be easy to reach a consensus and work out a common agreement?

Pluralism is a major asset of the National Development Council. Debates make sense as long as the President is able to learn different points of view, to weigh the pros and cons, and eventually forge his own opinion. The Council is there to show different possible solutions, or rather ideas of solutions to existing problems. If there are diverging opinions, the Council is not supposed to standardise them, but to present them to the President. Through the exchange of views, through debates, the Council brings up arguments and counterarguments on various issues. Evidently, discussion increases the chances for the convergence of views, for adhering to one or another side. But consensus is not a primary goal. Sometimes topics discussed, such as climate protection, raise disputes and doubts everywhere in the world. Through its opinions and reports, the Council points out that some of the topics related PM

Our Guest to climate change are not sufficiently examined and require caution in decision-making.

How do you intend to serve the purpose of the Council?

I am an economist – a scientist. Based on my knowledge of the theory, practice and empirical research conducted in the Warsaw School of Economics, I am able to articulate my opinion on at least some of the social and economic issues. But this does not mean that my opinion will be taken into consideration by the President and will provide the basis for decisions. Central decisions are always the result of many factors, not only economic but also political, social and others. It is not enough to be right in substance. In practice, substantive reasons are subject to adjustment in view of the political considerations, legislative process and parliamentary procedures, including the results of the vote on draft laws.

PM

How did you find the policy statement of Prime Minister Beata Szydło? Are entrepreneur-friendly reforms planned?

In the sphere of the economy, I believe that most of the directions laid out in the policy statement are right. I mean especially the announced measures to revive investment. It is because investment conditions the pace of economic growth.

Yet, not all the proposals are right to my mind. For instance, I have some reservations about the idea of free medicines for persons aged over 75. I am generally opposed to free distribution, as it is not conducive to efficiency. “What is donated is not respected,” a saying goes. Unfortunately, this might generate waste and other irregularities. I cannot agree to the lowering of retirement age either. But the key point of the policy statement - investment and social and economic development - is fully approvable. Prime Minister Beata Szydło pointed to the need of stepping up investment. This is right.

There is no harmonious development without investment. It should be remembered that development is a broader notion than economic growth. Development consist of at least three elements: economic growth, social progress (improved health care, access to education, etc.) and ecological progress, climate and environmental protection. Only positive changes occurring in all of these areas imply social and economic development. Poland does record economic growth, but it is not synonymous with social and economic development in the full sense of the term. It is true that we have in Poland a GDP growth rate exceeding 3%, but it is still not enough to make progress which would translate into sufficient improvement in life quality, elimination of social exclusion, etc.

Speaking of incentives for entrepreneurs, Beata Szydło announced what is called the double depreciation of fixed assets. Basically, this means that deductible costs reported for tax purposes will be higher, and therefore businesses will pay lower taxes.

PM

Will such incentives be effective?

This will depend on the general business conditions, on public investment in education, infrastructure, energy, on the quality of law drafting and enforcement. All this defines the conditions for conducting business.

PM

Could you sum up the year 2015 in the economy?

It was a good year for the economy, a year in which the economic growth rate exceeded 3%, which positively distinguishes Poland against the EU background. Unemployment decreased and, for the first time since the regime change, even PM

fell below 10%. Exports went up, and this despite a variety of obstacles, including Russia’s embargo on Polish food products.

For all these successes, however, there are still many unsolved problems. Poland is a catching-up country, and it would be desirable to speed up GDP growth to narrow the gap separating us from the developed countries. It is also necessary to counteract social dysfunction, including social exclusion. Poland is the EU’s record holder in terms of employee-unfriendly job contracts. There are too many junk contracts, which is not conducive to raising the quality of life, civilising work relations. We are facing a dichotomy on the labour market. That is to say that those who have jobs are overworked, because they actually work much more than the Labour Code would permit, while others do not have work at all. This points to the weakness of the state in labour law enforcement. However, contrary to what was announced in the policy statement, junk contracts cannot be eliminated entirely, because there are specific activities which require such civil contracts. This applies to areas such as catering, or tourism, which are subject to seasonality. Therefore, it is difficult to assume that you can do away with junk contracts altogether. What is important is to eradicate pathologies in this field, to prevent situations where a person actually works full time, and the contract states otherwise.

What are the priorities of the Polish Economic Society for 2016?

The Polish Economic Society (PTE) is an institution of public benefit. The statutory obligations of PTE include, among others, spreading economic knowledge. Economic ignorance puts people at risk of costly errors. Deprived of economic knowledge, you can fall victim to economic fraud and embezzlement. The market has no enemy, but it has many victims, including victims of economic ignorance. Deficiencies in economic knowledge disturb the progress of democracy, the proper functioning of the market economy and enjoyment of its benefits. Economic knowledge gaps are a barrier to economic rationalisation; economic knowledge helps avoid wrong decisions.

In taking care of economic education, PTE draws attention to the fact that economics is not chrematistics. Chrematistics is an art of making money, and economics is a science of making economic decisions. PTE aims to demonstrate the connections between the economy and the social situation. If the economy does not work towards improving social conditions, like health, for instance, then economic growth will not translate into social and economic development and better life quality. Therefore, the priority of the Polish Economic Society is to promote economic knowledge but also to prevent anomie or chaos in the system of social values. Such a chaos manifests itself in the “greed-is-good” motto, which was forged into a business ideology and became one of the causes of the financial crisis that started in 2008 in the United States. Its outcomes have affected many countries and proved to be long-term, continuing in some areas till today. One of the more dangerous consequences is the crisis of confidence, largely experienced by Poland. Confidence is a kind of lubricant for business. Therefore, financial education needs a holistic approach, taking into account social values. Such an approach is a priority for the Polish Economic Society.

• PM

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY TH

GALA

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY PRESENTED AT ANNUAL CEREMONY The 13th Pearls of the Polish Economy Gala, organized by the English-language economic magazine “Polish Market,” was held at Warsaw’s Royal Castle on November 6, 2015. The winners of the Pearls of the Polish Economy ranking, and laureates of the Honorary Pearl and Pearl of Innovation Progress 2015 awards were officially announced during the event. As usual, the deputy prime minister and minister of the economy, the president of the Polish Academy of Sciences, the rector of the Warsaw School of Economics and the mayor of Warsaw were patrons of the Gala.

The Pearl of the Polish Economy title is granted on the basis of the special criteria and methodology developed by scientists of the Decision Support and Analysis Unit at the Institute of Econometrics Warsaw School of Economics. For a company to take part in the ranking, it has to generate annual sales of at least PLN100 million (Large Pearls), or over PLN1 billion (Grand Pearls).

This year, 135 companies qualified for the Pearls of the Polish Economy league table.

KRYSTYNA WOŹNIAK-TRZOSEK, Editor-in- Chief of “Polish Market”: I have the great honour to welcome the distinguished guests at our annual Gala of the Pearls of the Polish Economy. We are meeting in the beautiful halls of the Royal Castle in Warsaw to honour, for the tenth time, outstanding Poles for their achievements in science, economy, culture, in promoting social and patriotic values, to award, for the thirteenth time, the most effective and dynamic Polish companies, and to hand out, for the fifth time, the Progress awards for innovative projects. The date of today’s gala- 6 November - is not accidental, as we are also meeting to mark the memory of Ignacy Jan Paderewski and, on the 155th anniversary of his birth, officially announce the inauguration of the 2nd International Festival dedicated to one of the greatest Poles, who opened for us the way to freedom and showed that the homeland can be served not only by weapons, but also by talent, knowledge, work and sacrifice for others. Therefore, the Sejm of the Republic of Poland, by the resolution of 11 September 2015, paid tribute to the great Pole, statesman, composer and pianist. Celebrating the attitudes, the Poles that are and can be a model for us and future generations, makes part of the mission of “Polish Market”– a monthly magazine that has been promoting the Polish economy, science and culture around the world for nearly 20 years. “Polish Market” shows positive examples, values upon which to build a strong society and a modern economy. A strong society and a modern economy make for the wealth of nations. No wonder that this year’s Nobel Prize in Economics was awarded to Prof. Angus Deaton, conducting studies on wealth and poverty.

It is not without reason if I cite here the opinion of another scholar, American economist and historian David Landes who, examining the causes of wealth and poverty of nations 8 years ago, found that if we learn anything from the history of economic development, it is that culture makes all the difference. No matter what you think of the thesis of the American scholar, one thing should garner consensus: culture is what constitutes the identity of a nation. And it has played

a particular role in the case of Poland. Pope John Paul II reminded us that it was culture that had helped us survive the loss of political and economic independence, and perhaps even more. Perhaps, as Prof. Ewa M. Thompson says, it is thanks to a strong Polish identity that Europe is still Europe. Perhaps Europe would long be under the Russian-German rule were it not for Polishness. Who knows? It is also true that culture is our brand, a strong brand. And a strong brand feeds into economic success. Entrepreneurs, especially exporters, and those who want to venture into the global markets realise the importance of a country’s strong brand. According to recent reports by the World Economic Forum and the National Bank of Poland, the Polish economy remains one of the most competitive among the post-communist countries. But we know very well that Poland owes its strong position mainly to its entrepreneurs. And today we will award the companies that perform best in terms of efficiency and growth. The ranking was developed and prepared, based on questionnaires sent out, by economists from the Warsaw School of Economics under the direction of Prof. Tomasz Szapiro. I would add that all those who qualified for the ranking receive the title of the Pearl of the Polish Economy. For the fifth time, we will hand out the Pearls of Innovation – Progress awards. These Pearls are awarded by “Polish Market” and the Central Council of Research Institutes under the guidance of Prof. Leszek Rafalski. Today’s Gala also marks the tenth anniversary of Honorary Pearls. For the past ten years, great Poles who arned merits in economy, science, culture and in promoting patriotic and social values have been decorated with Honorary Pearls in the beautiful ballroom of the Royal Castle. Sadly, some of them are no longer among us today, but the memory of them will last as in Horace’s song ‘Non omnis moriar’. Let me recall, on the occasion of this anniversary, the names of those who passed away: Henryk Strzelecki, Wojciech Kilar, Ryszard Kaczorowski, Sławomir Skrzypek, Colonel Jerzy Woźniak, Tadeusz Mazowiecki, Władysław Bartoszewski, Jan Kulczyk. I am very happy to see here the winners of the previous years. Many thanks that you wished to be here and celebrate with us this anniversary. I would also like to extend the words of gratitude to our wonderful Jury for its 10 years’ challenging work. I wish continued success to all the winners.

I also wish all the best to the new Polish government so it is up to the difficult tasks it faces, particularly in the area of economic freedom, innovation and brand building. While saying so, let me remind you that latest ratings point to Poland’s political stability. And political stability is what I wish us all today.

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY JANUSZ

PIECHOCIŃSKI , former Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy, honorary patron of the Gala of the Pearls of the Polish Economy: “A year ago, here, in this hall, we celebrated the 25th anniversary of a free, democratic and European Poland.

Today, we are starting another year with faith and hope that the next 25 years will be even better, because we can afford it. Let’s just look at how many awards and thanks have been given by the organisers today. I am glad that traditionally we meet here - in this symbolic place - and that traditionally Ms Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek reminds us of the essence of patriotism, also that important one, which grows from culture. We need to remember that over generations culture has been the field where we defended our standing most effectively. Chopin once said: ‘The Muscovite bullet won’t kill me, I will defeat the enemy armies

with a nocturne.’ But nocturnes, mazurkas, polonaises are not only in the world of music, but also in the world of entrepreneurship, business and exports. You have to go through life with optimism, keep crossing borders. The good signs of recent years seem to show that Poland is increasingly powerful, that Poland and Poles do better than ever: not so long ago we had a 19% share of exports in GDP, last year it was 42%, and next year, and I say this with faith and optimism, it will be 48%. By 2020, it has to be more than 60%. This is not happening by itself. So it is worth talking about the presentday patriots. Not only those who are not afraid, who, through their actions, rationality and wisdom, take care not only of their own interests, but also those who are building a community. Those who know that you cannot be afraid of what is coming, that you cannot underestimate threats, but you have to capture opportunities at the same time. Therefore, I would like to express special thanks for the honour I have had for the past 3 years of representing the excellent, Polish economy, for this great effort on your - entrepreneurs, artists, scientists and civil servants - side. Thanks to you, the brand ‘Poland’ sounds as strong, as optimistic, as successful as ever. It must be remembered, however, that things can always be better, so I am glad that we are back together because together we can do more. So let that ‘together’ and that ‘more’ be more.

PROF. TOMASZ SZAPIRO, Rector of the Warsaw School of Economics: “This ranking is a very good combination of the media and science. This is an extremely important matter, because if this relationship is not successful, the media without science become a hermitage of thoughtlessness, and science without the media becomes quite an abstraction. In this case, the ranking worked well, because

the “Polish Market’s” editorial team swiftly communicated surveys to economists. The ranking is very important because it is important to compile such information about market actors. And how does this ranking differ from other rankings? Well, we do not resort to experts, there is no problem of selecting experts, nor is there the problem of subjectivity. We process data that are available in every company, data that every company is obliged to provide to meet certain statistics requirements. Companies collect these data themselves and then send them in to “Polish Market” without fear of them being deformed. Certainly, we evaluate data, we do not visit companies. As with any ranking, we use some simplifications, but we are verifiable. Verifiable even by entrepreneurs themselves who wanted to participate in the ranking for the 13th time already.”

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

T

his year, the 2nd International Ignacy Jan Paderewski Festival was officially inaugurated during the Gala by Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz, mayor of Warsaw, and Wiesław Dąbrowski, president of the Ave Arte Foundation and director of the festival. November 6 marked the 155th anniversary of the great composer’s birth.

HANNA GRONKIEWICZ-WALTZ, Mayor of Warsaw:

Whenever I meet with entrepreneurs, I am satisfied that they are present and they are developing in Warsaw, as such local governments as the Capital City of Warsaw live off their taxes.

We appreciate entrepreneurship, we strive to promote innovation. A recent example of innovation is putting in place of 19115, a phone number where Warsaw residents can obtain information on various services. Also, with entrepreneurship in mind, we created the Entrepreneurship Centre on Smolna Street in Warsaw. It is used mainly by young start-uppers. Warsaw’s Praga has for years been a favourite district of creative entrepreneurs. We are going to set up the Creativity Centre on Targowa Street. All these projects demonstrate that we are keen for Warsaw to meet businessfriendliness standards so as to encourage investment and workrelaxation balance.

Opening the 2nd Ignacy Jan Paderewski International Festival, I would like to emphasise that Paderewski was an honorary citizen of Warsaw. He received citizenship in 1919, shortly after Józef Piłsudski. I hope that the festival will help revive the memory of Ignacy Jan Paderewski.

WIESŁAW DĄBROWSKI, President of the Ave Arte Foundation, Director of the Ignacy Jan Paderewski International Festival: The 2nd Ignacy Jan Paderewski International Festival runs from 6 to 12 November. I hope that the work of the great Pole, artist and philanthropist, will be fully presented, so that you can tell your children and grandchildren that such people are to be followed as examples. Faith and hard work is what can make you reach the heights of success, as shown by Ignacy Jan Paderewski.

Wiesław Dąbrowski (president of the Ave Arte Foundation), Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz (mayor of Warsaw) and Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek.

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THE ROYAL CASTLE IN WARSAW, NOVEMBER 6, 2015

HONORARY PEARLS THE JURY OF THE HONORARY PEARLS AWARD CHAIRMAN OF THE JURY: PROF. JANUSZ LIPKOWSKI, HEAD OF THE DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICAL CHEMISTRY OF SUPRAMOLECULAR COMPLEXES INSTITUTE OF PHYSICAL CHEMISTRY POLISH ACADEMY OF SCIENCES PROF. JERZY BUZEK,

CHAIRMAN OF ITRE COMMITTEE, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND POLISH PRIME MINISTER TADEUSZ DONOCIK,

PRESIDENT OF THE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE AND INDUSTRY IN KATOWICE

GRAﾅｻYNA JASKUﾅ、 , VICE-PRESIDENT OF OFICYNA WYDAWNICZA RYNEK POLSKI PROF. KSAWERY PIWOCKI,

FORMER RECTOR OF THE ACADEMY OF FINE ARTS IN WARSAW PROF. ANDRZEJ ROTTERMUND,

DIRECTOR OF THE ROYAL CASTLE IN WARSAW ADAM SZEJNFELD,

MEMBER OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT JANUSZ STEINHOFF, PHD,

FORMER DEPUTY PRIME PRIMER AND MINISTER OF THE ECONOMY, CHAIRMAN OF THE COUNCIL OF THE POLISH CHAMBER OF COMMERCE PROF. ANDRZEJ WISZNIEWSKI,

FORMER MINISTER OF SCIENCE AND FORMER RECTOR OF THE WROCﾅ、W UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY KRYSTYNA WOﾅｹNIAK- TRZOSEK, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, PRESIDENT OF THE RYNEK POLSKI PUBLISHERS CO. LTD.

BY ITS DECISION OF 2 JULY 2015, THE JURY DETERMINED THE WINNERS OF THE HONORARY PEARLS.

F

or 10 years the announcement of the list of the Pearls of the Polish Economy laureates has been coupled with the official presentation of Honorary Pearl awards. They go to outstanding people and institutions who may be regarded as ambassadors for the highest Polish values due to their professional work, experience, prestige and ethics.

ECONOMY CATEGORY

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

LESZEK CZARNECKI Leszek Czarnecki holds an MSc from the Wrocław University of Technology and PhD from the Wrocław University of Economics. Author of several papers and books on business, he is also a graduate of Harvard Business School (AMP). In 1986, he set up Przedsiębiorstwo Hydrotechniki i Inżynierii TAN SA, a diving and heights engineering company. Leszek Czarnecki is known for building new companies, making them flourish, and - once they become industry leaders - selling them. This was the case in 1991 of the European Leasing Fund, one of the first and eventually the most expansive lease companies in Poland.

In 2000, the company was floated on the London Stock Exchange. In 2003, he created Getin Holding, one of the biggest privately held financial groups in Poland, which comprised such units as Getin Bank and Noble Bank. The companies proved to be the fastest growing units on the Polish financial market and quickly conquered the relevant markets. Getin Holding is also very active in banking and lease markets in Russia, Ukraine, Romania and Belarus. Leszek Czarnecki created and inspired several business projects that achieved spectacular success in the Polish market, such as TU Europa, the second biggest insurance group, Home Broker, the leader in the estate market, Open Finance, the leading financial advisory services provider, LC Corp, the leading real estate developer, or the Sky Tower, the highest building in Poland.

MATEUSZ MORAWIECKI Mateusz Morawiecki was appointed as Minister of Development in the Cabinet of Beata Szydło on 16 November 2015. Previously he was at the helm of Bank Zachodni WBK SA since 2007. Over those years, the bank’s assets swelled more than twice and a half times, and net profit increased by almost 50%. He made his first steps in business while still in college, starting a publishing firms Reverentia and Enter. This experience meant that having obtained his MA in history he decided to pursue a career in management, which resulted in an MA in Business Administration from the Wrocław University of Technology, MBA from the University of Economics in Wrocław, and post-graduate diploma in European Law and Economic Integration from the University of Hamburg and an MA in Advanced European Studies from the University of Basel. In 1995 he did an internship at the Deutsche Bundesbank in Frankfurt. He came back to Poland in 1998, as he was offered a post at the Office of the Committee for European Integration negotiating the conditions of Poland’s accession to the EU. At the same time, he started working at Bank Zachodni SA as advisor to the President of the Board. Three years later, following the merger of Bank Zachodni and Wielkopolski Bank Kredytowy, he joined the Management Board of Bank Zachodni WBK. In May 2007, after a multi-stage recruitment process, the Supervisory Board nominated him for the post of President of the Board.

MICHAŁ SOŁOWOW Michał Sołowow has 10 start-ups to his credit, including Mitex, NOMI, Mitex Trade with MAX retail stores, Echo Investment, NorthFood, UltraPack, Nexterio or GetCar. Poland’s leader in terms of the number and quality of IPOs, he oversaw the flotation of 5 companies: PLI/NOMI SA, Echo Investment SA, Mitex SA, Cersanit SA, Barlinek SA. In 2013, he topped the list of the richest WSE investors. Two of his companies are listed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange: Rovese (formerly Cersanit) and Synthos. In 2014, he delisted Barlinek, one of the world’s wood flooring leaders; the world’s cutting-edge production capacity; plants in 3 countries (Poland, Ukraine, Romania). He owns a chain of over 100 KOMFORT retail stores, offering wooden flooring, paneling, carpeting and rugs. His assets are managed by funds - Magellan and FTF Columbus, investing in financial instruments with a potentially high rate of return, i.e. futures, currencies or commodities.

Innovative solutions and ideas have always been his domain. He carried out many undertakings as the first man in Poland. He calls himself a start-up developer who loves creating and building from scratch. He wants to meet the challenges of the 21st century.

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

In the Economy category, the Pearl was awarded to Mateusz Morawiecki. The award was collected on his behalf by Artur Sikora, Director of the Corporate Communication and Marketing Department at Bank Zachodni WBK.

In the Economy category, the Pearl was awarded to Leszek Czarnecki. The award was collected on his behalf by Piotr Kaczmarek, President of GetIn Holding.

In the Economy category, the Pearl was awarded to Michał Sołowow. The award was collected on his behalf by Andrzej Załucki, President of the Fabryka Marzeń Foundation.

ECONOMY DRIVING POLISH ENTREPRENEURSHIP

TADEUSZ DONOCIK First of all, thank you very much for the award. I would also like to say that in my fairly long life and in my over-30year business career, I was guided by the question once posed by John Paul II: Is it better to have, or to be? I tried my best to be able to answer: “to be”. At a regional level, we actually managed to do a lot, but I owe it also to teamwork. Thank you for recognising our efforts.

Tadeusz Donocik, Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek (Polish Market), Prof. Michał Kleiber and Herbert Wirth (President of the KGHM Polska Miedź)

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Tadeusz Donocik

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

JACEK JANISZEWSKI

When I was 34 years old and I had my first ministerial adventure under Prime Minister Suchocka under my belt, I decided to do something for politicians who I still did not understand too well at the time, because they often did not like each other. And they often even did not talk to each other. That is how the Poland-West Forum in Międzyzdroje was born. It was pursued in view of the second objective set initially, namely preparing Polish society and officials for integration with the European Union. We were then laughed at for daring to think about something like that. This goal has been achieved, and the last initiative ahead is to promote the region and Poland abroad. And I hope that things will get better and better and this work will never stop.

Jacek Janiszewski receives the Honorary Pearl from Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek and Prof. Michał Kleiber

Jacek Janiszewski

SCIENCE CATEGORY

PROF. MARIUSZ JASKÓLSKI

The world of science has its awards - usually given by scholars to scholars. The Nobel Prize is considered the world’s most prestigious award. In Poland, we also have a great prize - Award of the Foundation for Polish Science. But what I receive here – the Honorary Pearl – is for me a very special honour, because it shows that what we do in our laboratories has indeed a public feedback, is important, recognised and appreciated.

Today, I receive this award individually, but I receive it on behalf of a team. A team which was created spontaneously, on the basis of cooperation, man-to-man talking. We are a team of researchers with Polish roots and that is how are seen in the world - as Polish researchers. Some of us work in Poland, some in the United States. In Poland - apart from myself – Prof. Janusz Bujnicki, a computer scientist. Prof. Alexander Wlodawer works in the United States. We are surrounded by quite a few of young people whose enthusiasm and work have contributed greatly to the prize I receive today.

“ ...IS IMPORTANT, RECOGNISED AND APPRECIATED” Prof. Mariusz Jaskólski

Prof. Mariusz Jaskólski

Prof. Mariusz Jaskólski, prof. Henryk Skarżyński, Krystyna WoźniakTrzosek, Prof. Michał Kleiber and Herbert Wirth

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

CULTURE CATEGORY POLISH RADIO, ANDRZEJ SIEZIENIEWSKI, PRESINDET OF THE MANAGEMENT BOARD It is hard to imagine a man of the Polish Radio not to say a few words.

Thank you very much for this beautiful and prestigious award granted to the Polish Radio. It is all the more my pleasure and joy that the Polish Radio celebrates its 90th anniversary. The jubilee is usually a moment for sum-ups, self-assessment. I will say - perhaps immodestly - that these assessments are positive for us. The Polish Radio continues to be an important player on the radio market in our country and is one of the institutions with the highest public trust. The Pearl confirms that it is a well-deserved evaluation.

“THE PEARL CONFIRMS THAT IT IS A WELL-DESERVED EVALUATION.” Andrzej Siezieniewski

Andrzej Siezieniewski

Andrzej Siezieniewski, Czesław Szpojankowski (Totalizator Sportowy), Jerzy Maksymiuk, Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek, Prof. Michał Kleiber and Prof. Janusz Lipkowski

WŁODEK PAWLIK I would like to thank you very much for this wonderful award – you do not hold a pearl in your hand every day! It is very rare, and even more nice when you receive an award in such a illustrious company, in addition from the hands of such a great artist as maestro Jerzy Maksymiuk. It leaves me nothing more than to keep creating, to be with you and for you.

“YOU DO NOT HOLD A PEARL IN YOUR HAND EVERY DAY!” Włodek Pawlik

Włodek Pawlik

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

CULTURE APPLIED ART TOMASZ KONIOR (LETTER) Ladies and Gentlemen, The Honourable Jury of the Honorary Pearls of the Polish Economy, I welcomed the fact that you have decided to reward me with this honourable distinction this year. I am an architect. I design space - urban, public, communal, and private - houses, gardens, furniture, friendly venues and useful things. I realise that the resulting projects affect our everyday life, are expensive, more sustainable - hopefully timeless. So everything is based on trust. What could be the answer? High quality and customer satisfaction. I hope that I and my team will have an opportunity to design something of which you will be the recipients. I would like to thank you for the award and please forgive me that I cannot make it in person. Today my friend and mentor Krystian Zimerman, one of the greatest musicians of our time, gives in Berlin his 2000th concert. Were it not for his confidence, the NOSPR concert hall in Katowice with its topnotch acoustics would never be there and - perhaps - I would not receive this award. So thank you in advance for your understanding.

“EVERYTHING IS BASED ON TRUST” Tomasz Konior

In the Applied Arts category, the Pearl was awarded to Tomasz Konior. The award was collected on his behalf by Wojciech Przywecki, an architect at Konior Studio.

BARTOSZ PIOTROWSKI The Honorary Pearl, awarded by a Jury composed of authority figures, is a great honour for me. Design is the field of culture closely related to the economy. Properly used, it can have a very positive effect on it. I hope that awarding the Honorary Pearl to a person involved in design will contribute to enhancing cooperation between entrepreneurs and designers.

Because design is not merely about “nice decoration”. Informed design is part of the growing economy. Investment in this area mirrors the culture and quality of a society. It is a way of raising the profile of our country and a way of building its positive image.

Bartosz Piotrowski, Prof. Ksawery Piwocki, Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek, Prof. Michał Kleiber, Prof. Janusz Lipkowski

PROMOTING SOCIAL VALUES RAFAŁ SONIK (LETTER)

The Honourable Jury, Dear Laureates, Ladies and Gentlemen, A few years ago, my team gave me a gift - a statue that carried a quote from Leopold Staff: “And the winner is one who will give others most of his world.” This is the principle I strive to follow in my life, therefore I felt honoured when the Jury chose me in the 10th edition of the Honorary Pearls and appreciated my commitment and work for the development of our society. I regret that I cannot be with you today at the Royal Castle in Warsaw, but I know that the Honorary Pearl for promoting social values is for me a very important distinction for one more reason - I believe there is no better investment than an investment in society. Pearl is therefore also for all those with whom I work, because they learn from me just as I learn from them to perceive and understand the world from very different angles.

“ I BELIEVE THERE IS NO BETTER INVESTMENT THAN AN INVESTMENT IN SOCIETY” Rafał Sonik

In the Promoting Social Values category, the Pearl was awarded to Rafał Sonik.

The award was collected on his behalf by his father, Stanisław Sonik.

Stanisław sonic, Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek, Prof. Michal Kleiber, Prof. Janusz Lipkowski and Elżbieta Radziszewska

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

PROMOTING POLISH TRADITIONS AND PATRIOTIC VALUES LAUDATION FOR DOMINICAN FATHER LUDWIK WIŚNIEWSKI SAID PROF. ANDRZEJ WISZNIEWSKI Ladies and Gentlemen, Father Ludwik Wiśniewski, whom I have considered my friend for half a century and I hope that he also regards me as his friend - brings around him student chaplaincies and shows them the way to life, but perhaps even more so - the way to Poland. I do not know, Ludwik, if you remember our first meeting, Ludwik. It was a cold night of 14 December and you were, together with the striking students, in the main building of the Wrocław University of Technology. You did not want to leave them, although the riot police patrols (ZOMO) were right in the front of the windows assaulting another building.

I will never forget this. Then I realised that you are a man who... Well I did not think you will be receiving the Honorary Pearl at the Royal Castle in Warsaw. At that time, no one expected something like this, but I must admit that it is hard to imagine anyone could match you in promoting patriotic values. Therefore, I am very proud to be able to hand you the Pearl.

Prof. Andrzej Wiszniewski

DOMINICAN FATHER LUDWIK WIŚNIEWSKI Thank you very much for this surprise award. More recently - apart from getting insults - I am honoured in many places. I am not sure whether I deserve these distinctions - probably not. But I accept it, albeit with embarrassment. If there are some people here tonight who should be congratulated and bowed to are the creators of this evening and this event. You need to have the courage, but also the wisdom to combine the promotion of entrepreneurship and economy with the promotion of science, culture and patriotism.

I think that the Honorary Pearls Gala has been for ten years a great lesson for entire Poland, and perhaps not only for Poland. I wish to thank you for this award for me, but most of all I wish to thank you - the creators and organisers - for promoting this kind of thing.

“I THINK THAT THE HONORARY PEARLS GALA HAS BEEN FOR TEN YEARS A GREAT LESSON FOR ENTIRE POLAND, AND PERHAPS NOT ONLY FOR POLAND” Ludwik Wiśniewski Dominican Father Ludwik Wiśniewski

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Dominican Father Ludwik Wiśniewski receives the Honorary Pearl from Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

Laureates of the Honorary Pearls 2015

Laureates of the Honorary Pearls 2006-2015 12/2015  polish market

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

THE WINNERS OF THE RANKING

GRAND PEARLS THE RESULTS OF THE PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY RANKING WERE ANNOUNCED DURING THE GALA. IN THE GRAND PEARLS CATEGORY THE WINNERS WERE: • • •

• •

Rossmann Supermarkety Drogeryjne Polska Sp. z o.o. is a leader of drugstore chains in terms of size, product quality and customer trust. It is the largest retail chain in Poland, with a 17% market share in the chemical and cosmetics industry.

ROSSMANN SUPERMARKETY DROGERYJNE POLSKA SP. Z O.O.

GRUPA KAPITAŁOWA ALUMETAL SA WĘGLOKOKS SA

IN THE LARGE PEARLS CATEGORY THE WINNERS WERE: •

ROSSMANN SUPERMARKETY DROGERYJNE POLSKA SP. Z O.O. 1ST PLACE – GRAND PEARLS

Marek Maruszak, President of Rossmann Supermarkety Drogeryjne Polska Sp . z o.o.

ZARZĄD MORSKIEGO PORTU GDYNIA SA

PROCHEM SA GRUPA KAPITAŁOWA COLIAN SA

IN THE FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS CATEGORY THE WINNERS WERE: •

• •

METLIFE TOWARZYSTWO UBEZPIECZEŃ NA ŻYCIE I REASEKURACJI SA

Grzegorz Stulgis, President of the Supervisory Board of Alumetal SA

GRUPA KAPITAŁOWA ALUMETAL SA 2ND PLACE – GRAND PEARLS

Robert Kwaśniak, Vice-President of the Management Board of Węglokoks SA

WĘGLOKOKS SA 3RD PLACE – GRAND PEARLS

SANTANDER CONSUMER BANK SA DEUTSCHE BANK POLSKA SA

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FromLeft: Prof. Tomasz Szapiro, Krytyna Woźniak-Trzosek, Marek Maruszak, Janusz Piechociński, Robert Kwaśniak

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

LARGE PEARLS JANUSZ JAROSIŃSKI, PRESIDENT OF ZARZĄD MORSKIEGO PORTU GDYNIA SA (PORT OF GDYNIA AUTHORITY) 1ST PLACE – LARGE PEARLS PM: How do you find the award you have been presented today? It was definitely deserved, considering the developments occurring in Polish ports over the past few years.

It is certainly a great satisfaction. The award comes as a result of a fantastic teamwork. We were able to create a team integrated around the implementation of specific objectives; we have significant, reliable and long-term business partners. You can only think of succeeding in business if all these elements harmonise with each other. If you look at the performance of individual ports, you can see, I would say it perhaps immodestly, that these last few years have been very successful for the Port of Gdynia, despite it struggling with difficult operating conditions. On the one hand, cargo handling records, on the other hand - and I think it is even more important - privatisation, which ended in great success, as we fully secured the interests of the State Treasury, the Port itself, but also those of employees of privatised companies. It has been 12 years since the first privatisation and you can see that all these companies perform very well, people are satisfied, wages are rising, new investments are made; you can see just that the Port of Gdynia is developing as it should. Of course, the fact that the Polish economy is developing dynamically does have a positive impact on our business, too. It is always said that ports are kind of a barometer of economic growth, and there are many good signs out there. Last year, Polish ports set a cargo handling record. Provided that nothing negative happens in the global economy, I believe in the long term we can be confident that Polish ports will continue to excellently meet the needs of the Polish economy.

Marek Kiersznicki, Vice-President of the Management Board of Prochem SA

PROCHEM SA 2ND PLACE – LARGE PEARLS

Tomasz Piotrowski, Colian SA

GRUPA KAPITAŁOWA COLIAN SA 3RD PLACE – LARGE PEARLS

From left: Prof. Tomasz Szapiro, Marek Kiersznicki, Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek, Janusz Jarosiński, Jerzy Piechociński, Tomasz Piotrowski12/2015 polish market 27

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

PEARLS OF THE FINANCIAL SECTOR ŁUKASZ KALINOWSKI, PRESIDENT METLIFE TUNŻIR SA OF (METLIFE LIFE INSURANCE AND REINSURANCE COMPANY) 1ST PLACE- PEARLS OF THE FINANCIAL SECTOR Receiving the Pearl of the Polish Economy is a great honour. It is our pleasure to have been among the Pearls’ winners for many years. We pride ourselves on holding the title of the Pearl of the Polish Economy in the category of Financial Institutions, because we know that this is not a discretionary nomination, but a nomination that results from economic indicators. As a company, we keep attaching a lot of importance to these criteria - growth and efficiency. We are a good company and we are pleased that this finds recognition from experts. The title of the Pearl of the Polish Economy is widely used in our promotional materials, as it is an additional source of prestige for our company.

SANTANDER CONSUMER BANK SA 2ND PLACE – PEARLS OF THE FINANCIAL SECTOR Arkadiusz Wiktor Przybył, President of the Management Board of the Santander Consumer Bank SA

DEUTSCHE BANK POLSKA SA 3RD PLACE – PEARLS OF THE FINANCIAL SECTOR Krzysztof Kalicki, President of the Management Board of the Deutsche Bank Polska

From left: Prof. Tomasz Szapiro, Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek, Krzysztof Kalicki, Janusz Piechociński, Arkadiusz Przybył, Łukasz Kalinowski

AWARD FOR PROMOTING ECOLOGY

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From left: Piotr Ziemann, Wawrzyniec Maziejuk, Władysław Ortyl, Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek, Janusz Rodziewicz, Lucjan Zwolak, Henryk Skórnicki, Stefan Jerzy Pielech

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

PERŁY POLSKIEJ GOSPODARKI

Prestiżowy ranking polskich przedsiębiorstw

THE GRAND AWARDS GALA

OF THE PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY 2015

The editors of "Polish Market" would like to thank all the Patrons and Media Partners for their help in organising the Gala of the Pearls of the Polish Economy.

We wish you every success in the coming year and we hope to be able to continue cooperation in 2016 as we will be celebrating the 20th anniversary of "Polish Market".

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

PROGRESS 2015 THE ENTERPRISE CATEGORY ANDRZEJ RAMEL, MARKETING AND DOMESTIC SALES DIRECTOR OF TUBĄDZIN MANAGEMENT GROUP SP. Z O.O., COLLECTED THE AWARD.

The Tubądzin Group is one of the leading Polish manufacturers of ceramic tiles, a leader of innovation. The company operates two manufacturing plants in Ozorków and Tubądzin, as well as the Logistics Centre in Cedrowice. Tubądzin sells its products on twenty international markets, owing its success, among other things, to modern designs developed by the most acclaimed Polish designers. It is awarded Progress 2015 for continuous improvement of logistics and distribution processes, consistent expanding of the product portfolio and modern design. The owner of the Tubądzin Group is Andrzej Wodzyński.

KRZYSZTOF KULESZA,SPOKESMAN FOR PIT-RAWDAR COLLECTED THE AWARD. RYSZARD KARDASZ, PRESIDENT OF PIT -RADWAR SA SAID AFTER THE GALA OF THE PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY:

An award for a company is always a proof of its ennoblement. Awards ceremonies are attended by members of the government, various organisations, and sometimes the customer, which in our case is the army. Such events are covered by the press, so each prize is a form of promotion, effective advertisement that builds a good image of the winner among the readers, and thus potential customers.

The awards and prizes we get for specific products at the International Defence Industry Exhibition in Kielce, for instance, are more important for us, because they show that the company is innovative, able to bring to the market a specific product ultimately accepted by the customer. However, the award for the entire company, and the Pearl of Innovation Progress 2015 is definitely one, works to its advantage, just as awards for efficiency do. It proves that the company was noticed by the organiser of the competition. The same is true of the employee awards. That is why I do not file, do not rank the many accolades received by PIT-RADWAR.

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

THE RESEARCH INSTITUTE CATEGORY PROF. JERZY JELEŃKOWSKI, DEPUTY SCIENCE DIRECTOR, INSTITUTE OF PRECISION MECHANICS:

We are satisfied with having been granted the Pearl of Innovation Progress 2015, which will take a dignified place among the many national and foreign awards received by the Institute. The Jury acclaimed the results of our work, placing a special emphasis on industrial implementations and research projects, which are always the result of scientific thought. It also recognised the success of our previous industrial and technological deployments, such as refining steel or ceramics.

THE SCIENTIFIC PERSONALITY CATEGORY PROF. ADAM GACEK, DIRECTOR OF THE INSTITUTE OF MEDICAL TECHNOLOGY AND EQUIPMENT:

“The Pearl of Innovation Progress 2015 that I was granted by “Polish Market” for my scientific and innovative activities is one of the many awards I have received, but it is hard to say which one is the most prestigious. The prize testifies to the fact that my accomplishments as an initiator and co-founder of a number of innovative projects have been appreciated and recognised as eligible for the prize.

It should be noted, however, that at the time of the knowledge-based economy innovation is often the result of teamwork. Therefore, at this point, I would like first of all to warmly thank my colleagues from the Institute of Medical Technology and Equipment (ITAM) in Zabrze, who have their share in this success. ITAM has already earned the Economic Award of the President of Poland, the Polish Product of the Future award as well as many other awards, including twice Grand Prix, at the World Exhibition of Innovation, Research and New Technology Brussels Innova. The Pearl of Innovation is another award confirming the validity of our work: creating innovative developments, such as a stimulus device to assist hemodynamics during a surgery CardiAccel ANP-701 - Grand Prix at BRUSSELS INNOVA 2011 and Polish Product of the Future 2011, or thermal imaging support system for diagnosis of burn and non-healing wounds - Gold Medal of Distinction at Brussels Innova 2013.

All innovations developed by ITAM are implemented either directly in healthcare units, as special systems or medical devices, or in companies manufacturing medical equipment. It is not mass production but highly specialised production of advanced technology.

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From left: Andrzej Ramel, Błażej Grabowski, Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek, Krzysztof Kulesza, Grażyna Jaskuła, Prof. Jerzy Jeleńkowski, Prof. Adam Gacek and prof. Leszek Rafalski

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

THE POLISH ECONOMY From left: Janusz Piechociński (former Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of the Economy), Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek (Editor-in-Chief of the Polish Market) and Edward Trzosek

Prof. Andrzej Wiszniewski, Paweł Skrzywanek (President of the Szczawno – Jedlina SPA) and Dominican Father Ludwik Wiśniewski

Wiesław Dąbrowski (President of Ave Arte Foundation) and Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz (Mayor of Warsaw)

Herbert Wirth (president of KGHM Polska Miedź SA) and Prof. Tomasz Szapiro (Rector of the Warsaw School of Economics)

From left: Prof. Janusz Lipkowski, Prof. Bogdan Marciniec and Prof. Marek Krawczyk

Elżbieta Radziszewska (former Deputy Speaker of the Parliament) and Dominican Father Ludwik Wiśniewski Prof. Marek Krawczyk (Rector of the Medical University of Warsaw) and Prof. Michał Kleiber (Vice-Presindet of European Academy of Sciences and Arts)

From left: Błażej Grabowski, Prof. Tomasz Szapiro and Prof. Tomasz Kuszewski

GALA

From left: Katarzyna Biernacka, Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek and count Adam Stefan Zamoyski (Historian)

Janusz Piechociński

•

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Andrzej Siezieniewski, President of the Management Board of the Polish Radio with his wife

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

From left: Włodek and Jolanta Pawlik, Andrzej Załucki (President of the Fabryka Marzeń Foundation)

Urszula Ciołeszyńska, Maria Donocik, Tadeusz Donocik and Ewa Piacentile

Andrzej Siezieniewski (Polish Radio)

Prof. Witold Rużyłło, Krystyna WoźniakTrzosek and Prof. Elżbieta Mączyńska (President of the PTE)

From Left: Irena Koźmińska, Błażej Grabowski and Jerzy Koźmiński

Jacek Janiszewski and Jacek Socha Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek, Janusz Piechociński and Herbert Wirth (KGHM) From left: Prof. Henryk Skarżyński, Ewa and Jerzy Maksymiuk, Henryk Wojnarowski

Henryk Wojnarowski (Choirmaster, director of the Warsaw Philharmonic Choir) and Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek

From left: Ewa Mańkiewicz-Cudny (NOT), Prof. Danuta Ciechańska and Prof. Adam Gacek

Tadeusz Donocik and Edward Trzosek

Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek and Monika Piątkowska (Member of the Management Board of the PMPG Polskie Media)

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

Ewa and Jerzy Maksymiuk, Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek

Włodek Pawlik

Krystyna Wożniak-Trzosek and Andrzej Parafiniuk

Andrzej Szumowski (Vice-President of the Management Board Wyborowa Pernod Ricard) and Krzysztof Kalicki (President of Deutsche Bank Polska)

Andrzej Frajndt Agata Zakrzewska Artis Sonus choirand under direction of Jacek Sykulski

Aleksandra Orłowska

Władysław Ortyl (Marshal of the Podkarpackie Region) Kamil Czeszel

From left: Wiesław Rozłucki, Witold and Monika Zaraska

Małgorzata Morańska and Łukasz Kalinowski (President of MetLife - Life Insurance and Reinsurance Company)

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Marcin Petrykowski with an accompanying Julia Łozowska person

Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek and Urszula Potęga Agata Zakrzewska

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

From left: Tadeusz Donocik, Wiesław Rozłucki and Jacek Jerzy andSocha Irena Koźmiński

Teresa Sukniewicz-Kleiber, Prof. Michał Kleiber, Krystyna Sinfonia VarsoviaWoźniak-Trzosek and Prof. Andrzej Wiszniewski

Prof. Andrzej Wiszniewski

From left: Czesław Szpojankowski (Totalizator Sportowy) and Herbert Wirth (President of the KGHM Polska Miedź SA)

Prof. Marek Krawczyk

Stanisław Sonik Prof. Mariusz Jaskólski and Prof. Bogdan Marciniec

Prof. Leszek Rafalski and Prof. Elżbieta Mączyńska

Denis Yessentaev (Embassy of Kazakhstan)

Błażej Grabowski and Adam Półgrabia (President of the Mangement Board, TRIAS)

Trio Impresja during the performance Agata Zakrzewska

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

Jolanta Pawlik, Woźniak-Trzosek, SenatorKrystyna Józef Pinior, Waldemar Dąbrowski, Włodek Andrzej Załucki Prof.Pawlik Michałand Kleiber, Teresa Sukniewicz-Kleiber

Andrzej Franjdt, Krystyna Giersz, Tadeusz Donocik and Maria Donocik

Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek and Aleksandra Defitowska (Wittchen)

Marcin Bronikowski (Tenor) with his parents, Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek, Bogumiła Stoła, Andrzej Grzegorczyk and Teresa Sukniewicz-Kleiber

Miłosz Dorsz, Ewelina Janczylik-Forys, Grażyna Jaskuła and Artur Wojciechowski

Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek and Jacek Drzewicki Marcin Bronikowski and Edward Trzosek (Tenor) From left: Wojciech Kozar, Beata Kozar, Katarzyna Niedużak, Anna Wiosna, Marta Jasiczek, Jasiczek, Tomasz Wiosna Guests atAgata Arkady Kubickiego

Editorial board of “Polish Market”

Marek (Poet) and Andrzej Załucki GuestsMajewski and the editorial board of „Polish Market”

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Piotr Salaber (Musician, compositor) and Krystyna Katarzyna Niedużak Woźniak-Trzosek and Błażej Grabowski

Ryszard Basiuk and Renata Bielecka (TVP)

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

Małgorzata and Marek Kołakowscy and Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek

Ewa Maksymiuk and Andrzej Soldaty

Prof. Henryk Skarżyński and Renata Korneluk

Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek, prof. Marek Tukiendorf (Rector of the Opole University of Technology) with accompanying person

Edward Piekarski (Polish Chamber of Commerce for High Technology (PIGZT))

Royal Castle’s Arkady Kubickiego Robert Ziółek (CEO of the 01CYBERATON) and Andrzej Foremny (01CYBERATON) with accompanying person

Andrzej Załucki

Royal Castle’s Arkady Kubickiego

Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek and Przemysław Federowicz

Royal Castle’s Arkady Kubickiego

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

MICHAŁ SOŁOWOW

A VISIONARY

IS LOOKING

FORWARD

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

I

t is almost 30 years ago that he set up his first business, a construction firm Mitex, in his hometown of Kielce. He developed it on such a scale that in 2001 it was sold to Eiffage, a French giant in the building sector. He started off with a modest capital of USD10,000, the money he had earned when he was still a university student. He managed to multiply the capital many times thanks to his accurate investment decisions. Who is this man? An entrepreneur who has created businesses from scratch, conducted several dozen M&A deals and does business in over 30 countries across the world.

A visionary who has floated the first private company on the Warsaw Stock Exchange and a sportsman who for 15 years managed to combine the expansion of his business with participation in car rallies.

This person is Michał Sołowow. He has never shun risk. Quite the opposite, he has sought risk, leaving his competitors and rivals behind.

Today, his wealth is estimated at over PLN8.3 billion. He is among the most titled rally drivers. But more challenges are ahead.

FROM THE BUILDING SECTOR… He built his empire in the same way as he carried out the first projects of the construction firm Mitex and a developer Echo Investment – consistently, step by step. Thanks to his effort, Echo Investment turned from a small business into a property market giant. The company has already carried out more than 120 projects in a few dozen Polish cities, with a combined total space exceeding 1,100,000 sq m. In 2011, Michał Sołowow personally opened an extension of its shopping mall in Kielce.

Several months later, the mall was recognized as the best shopping centre in Europe, winning a prize in the MAPIC Awards competition during Europe’s largest commercial real estate exhibition in Cannes.

Echo Investment also won twice in a row the title of Developer of the Year in the CEE Retail Awards competition run by Europa Property.

In interviews, the businessman stressed on many occasions that in fact he had never earned the mythical first million because he reinvested all the profits in business expansion. Thanks to his hard work, modesty and innate intuition, he has already earned not millions but billions. He was ahead of the competition with his innovative approach and high ambition. He built from scratch and expanded Poland’s first chain of large supermarkets, which he then sold to a Dutch retailing group Ahold. He did the same with a nationwide chain of DIY stores Nomi, which afterwards was taken over by a British retailing company Kingfisher. He has never been afraid of cooperation with foreign partners. He sold hotels developed by Echo Investment to a French hotel chain Accor; sold UltraPack - a cardboard packaging producer to Mondi, a global paper and packaging giant. This year, the investment fund controlled by Oaktree Capital Management and Pimco paid over PLN1 billion to take over his stake in Echo Investment. It is this uncompromising strategy that has led him to the top in business. Whenever an opportunity appeared to sell a business at a good price, he immediately took advantage of it and spent the proceeds on further investments.

Production plant of chemical giant Synthos, Oświęcim near Kraków.

Komfort retail chain was acquired by the billionare in 2013.

…TO MULTIPLE BUSINESSES He stresses the importance of good timing in business – he sold Mitex just before a recession in the building sector. He bought a stake in Synthos, which is now the jewel in the crown of Michał Sołowow’s empire, before the golden era of the chemical sector. In the years of a global economic slowdown, when an overwhelming majority of businesses were cutting costs and production, Michał Sołowow took on another challenge – he took the risk and invested in the expansion of the

Barlinek is a top global wooden floor manufacturer.

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

Rovese has 10 production plants located in 5 countries.

investment projects in Romania and Ukraine, it recorded a many-fold increase in its value and is now a European leader. The term “Barlinek floorboard” is used to denote a whole category of wooden flooring. In his activity, Michał Sołowow puts emphasis on synergy and vertical dependence. At the end of 2013, he took over Komfort, a chain of stores specialising in flooring and accessories.

Michał Sołowow is the largest Polish investor in Russia and China. In 2014, Rovese invested around EUR70 million in a new plant near Moscow. The total value of FDI made by the group in Russia is estimated at over EUR200 million. By 2018 Barlinek is going to spend nearly EUR80 million on a new plant for the production of floorboards in the north-western part of Russia. As far as the Chinese market is concerned, the billionaire has not only a factory, but also a sales office responsible for acquiring chemical raw materials for Synthos and seeking new investment possibilities in that region. To illustrate the scale of Michał Sołowow’s business operations one should add that the group as a whole has spent more than PLN12 billion on development and investment.

FIFTH GEAR

Michał Sołowow during 2014 Rally Finland.

plant to raise its production capacity. The decision was like hitting the bull’s eye. In 2011, Synthos generated a net income of almost PLN1 billion. At present, Synthos, worth over PLN5 billion, is a leading synthetic rubber and polystyrene producer worldwide. The company spends tens of millions zlotys a year on research and development. Synthos works with such global players as Continental, Goodyear and Michelin. The Company has been named as a top Pirelli supplier for two consecutive years. Apart from the organic growth described above, Michał Sołowow has a unique track record in mergers and acquisitions. In 1996, he acquired Cersanit, a producer of sanitary ware which was then in decline. The company was restructured, merged with a producer of ceramic tiles Opoczno and afterwards it took over a German brand Meissen Keramik. Today, Rovese corporate group (composed of the companies mentioned above) is one of the world’s leaders in the sector of bathroom ceramics and tiles. Another company owned by the billionaire, Barlinek, has followed a similar path of growth.

The company, which specializes in the production of floorboards, had been on the verge of bankruptcy before being taken over, but after a series of acquisitions and greenfield

40 polish market

How does he cope with the stress and pressure resulting from such broad business activity? It is no secret that Michał Sołowow’s passion is sport, especially car rallies. His hobby was never a form of escape. Rallies were an element of his self-improvement and constant eagerness to compete at the highest level. From the very beginning of Synthos Cersanit Rally Team the businessman was personally involved in the organization and in the technological development of the cars which he used. All this is reflected in the numerous successes he had during participation in ERC and WRC. Just to mention that he won the title of European vice-Champion three times – in 2008, 2009 and 2012 – and was the Champion of Poland in 2007 in the S2000 series. He showed the same traits and virtues as a rally driver and as a businessman: he was courageous, uncompromising and goal-driven. In a prestigious Barbórka rally, in pursuit of precious seconds, he lost one wheel. Did he give up?

Nothing of the kind. He reached the finishing line and took a place on the podium. This year, Michał Sołowow decided to end sporting career and focus on new, even greater challenges on a larger scale.

A VISIONARY WITH A RECIPE FOR THE FUTURE Innovative solutions and ideas have always been his domain. He carried out many undertakings as the first man in Poland. He calls himself a start-up developer who loves creating and building from scratch. Having ended the career in motor racing, he is looking for new challenges. He wants to meet the challenges of the 21st century. To do so, he invests in young Polish businesses working on new technologies with a global potential. He has bought a stake in OncoArendi Therapeutics, an innovative biotech company

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

specializing in developing and putting on the market new drugs for non-invasive asthma and cancer treatment. The company works closely with Yale University. The final tests of anti-asthma drug are now underway before the start of official trials required to put the drug into use. The billionaire did not stop here in his campaign against cancer. He also invested in NanoVelos, a company involved in commercializing innovative cancer treatment methods. The nanotechnology which makes it possible to deliver chemotherapeutic drugs directly into cancer cells is an ace up the company’s sleeve. Michał Sołowow also bought a stake in Adiuvo Investment, a fund investing in biomedical projects, like for example dietary supplements. His latest investment is 3D Gence, a company specializing in production of three-dimensional printers. The rapidly expanding market, Polish-German technology and exceptional durability and reliability are the advantages expected to help the company achieve the position of a global giant in 3D printing. And this is not the end. These investments are merely the beginning of this great race in the era of global challenges. But the billionaire will not give up before he reaches the finishing line - needless to say - in glory of the winner.

BUSINESS ASIDE With his daughter he has set up the “Dreams Factory” foundation to support gifted children and young people in developing their passions. One of the areas of activity for the foundation is education, personal development and scholarships. In conjunction with Rovese, Barlinek and Komfort, the foundation also renovates the homes of the most needy families.

To sum up, the billionaire from Kielce is not slowing down. He is expanding the scale of his activity. It seems he is revving up and setting himself even more ambitious • goals because business is a never-ending race.

PROFILE Michał Sołowow, age 53, has always been linked with Kielce. Being for years among the richest Poles, his wealth is estimated at PLN8.3 billion, according to a 2015 league table. His companies constitute one of the largest capital groups in the CEE region.

He often repeats that money is not a goal in itself, but merely an indicator of success. He has brought onto the stock exchange more companies than any other entrepreneur. In 2014, he won the title of Entrepreneur of a Quarter-Century in Poland. His companies provide employment to almost 14,000 people. He is Romania’s Honorary Consul General in Poland.

For 15 years participated in car rallies, including WRC and ERC, 3 times he was the vice-Champion of the continent. This year he received “Honorary Pearl” from Polish Market Magazine.

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Barlinek operates 3 plants in Poland, Ukraine and Romania, is commercially present in most European markets.

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PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

PEARL OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

MOTIVATION FOR FURTHER WORK

Grzegorz Stulgis, President of the Supervisory Board of Alumetal SA, the company which has been ranked second in the Grand Pearls league table of the Pearls of the Polish Economy.

You have been ranked second in the Grand Pearls category of the Pearls of the Polish Economy this year. What has contributed to this success? Is it due to your new investment projects, or the situation on the aluminium market?

First of all, we would like to express our thanks for this distinction. It was a very nice surprise for us. It will certainly have a favourable influence on our image among our business partners, including our customers and suppliers. This image is especially important for us because we are a company listed on a stock exchange. However, the most important thing about this distinction is that we feel satisfaction with our hard work and that someone from the outside has noticed our success. This gives us strong motivation to pursue our further goals. Our rapid expansion has certainly contributed to this distinction.

Alumetal is now the fourth largest company in its sector in Europe. At present, we have three plants in Poland. The third one, located in Nowa Sól, is the most modern one in Europe. It was launched in 2011 and expanded in 2013. It is to this plant that we owe the rapid increase in our revenues which secured us a place among Grand Pearls. The production capacity of our Polish plants is already fully utilized. Another stage in the company’s development is the construction of a fourth plant – the first one outside Poland. We deliberated for a long time which country in the region to choose. Finally, we placed our bet on Hungary.

PM

Why have you chosen this location?

There were several reasons behind this decision. Firstly, we are the leader of the Polish PM

42 polish market

market and Poland has become too small for us. At the same time, automotive production is expanding throughout the region. We compared Hungary with the Czech Republic.

Each of these countries has a well-developed automotive market. Their scrap metal markets are also similar. We chose a Hungarian location because it is situated at the right distance from our nearest Polish plant – the one in Kęty. We did not want the two plants’ activity areas to overlap because this would undermine our efficiency. Additionally, competition on the Hungarian market is not as strong as on the Czech one. The location we chose is very favourable as it is close to many countries where we already sell our products, like Romania and Slovenia. It will also enable us to penetrate new markets, like Austria and Switzerland. We hope that the Hungarian site will be another milestone on our development path.

You said the automotive market is your main customer. What is its percentage share and what are the other sectors which buy your products?

Transactions with the automotive market account for over 90% of our sales. The remaining 10% is distributed across various sectors, like for example the machine-building industry, household appliance sector and the construction industry. There is the trend now in the automotive industry to use more and more aluminium. The main reason is that aluminium parts are two times lighter than the same parts made of steel. A reduction in a vehicle’s weight is translated into a reduction in carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions, which PM

has been a very hot topic recently and a challenge facing the automotive industry.

Most of your customers are foreign companies. Is that right?

We sell more than 60% of our output outside Poland. And multinationals account for most of our customers in Poland. However, there are also many rapidly expanding Polish firms among our customers. It is very nice to see the successful activity of Polish companies on foreign markets, for example in the automotive sector, which is a very demanding customer by definition. I think that in 10 years’ time there will really be many Polish companies which have achieved success abroad.

PM

Have you an expansion plan ready to enable you, next year perhaps, to win first place in our ranking?

There is no success without effort. You have to work hard for a distinction. I think the next time we will be able to appear in your ranking in a high position will be in three or four years when we have fully carried out the business plan for our fourth plant – the one in Hungary.

PM

Do you have a plan for further foreign expansion, beyond Europe perhaps?

No, we do not because Europe is the market we are interested in. It is not profitable to transport our products from Europe to Asia or North America. We have to look for further expansion opportunities in Europe. We can see various directions here and we will be analysing them. But this is a question of another stage in Alumetal Group’s strategy – • for the period after 2017.

PM

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

THE PORT OF GDYNIA TO PREPARE FOR OCEAN

T

GOING MEGA CONTAINERSHIPS

he Port of Gdynia Authority S.A. is undergoing the project “Deepening of the Approach Fairway and Internal Water Reservoirs of the Port of Gdynia – Stage I - Expansion of Turning basin no. 2”.

The project is included in the investment plan of the Port of Gdynia Authority SA, adopted for the years 2014-2017. The investment includes demolition of the part of two piers, owned up to date by the Naval Shipyard, and moving their floating dock to a shipyard’s nearby area. The port authority and shipyard signed the agreement covering the whole project on the 27th January 2014. The estimated cost of the demolition, construction and dredging works, together with the cost of infrastructure purchase is approximately EUR 30 million. Until October 2014, The Port of Gdynia Authority S.A. successfully completed environmental research of the soil to be exploited and currently the designing process is to be started. Documentation with necessary administrative decisions are expected till the end of 2015. The whole works of the Stage I of the project are scheduled till the end of 2017.

Current investment is to be accomplished by Stage II - The deepening of the port basins up to 16 m, which has been already submitted for

co-funding from EU funds in the period 20152018 by the Port of Gdynia Authority SA. Located in the internal main channel of the Port of Gdynia, Turning basins no. 2 and no.3 currently allow rotating ships of up to 300 m long. According to the shipping operators plans, there is a need to increase these parameters - to allow the Port of Gdynia to accommodate container ships operating between Asian and European ports, with direct calls to the Baltic Sea. The navigational analysis showed that the best location for the expanded turning basin is in the line of the port’s main channel, next to Basin IX (area of the existing turning basin no. 2), in which the hydro-technical structures owned up to date by the Naval Shipyard are located.

The newly started project will allow expanding Turning basin no. 2 to the diameter of 480m, it will be possible to accommodate ships with the length of at least 384 m - 400 m ( depending on the regulations of The Maritime Office in Gdynia) and capacity of at least 14 000 TEU. After completing the investments in infrastructure and technical equipment currently undertaken by the Port Authority together with Baltic Container Terminal (subsidiary of ICTSI Group) and Gdynia Container Terminal

(subsidiary of Hutchison Port Holding), handling capacity in Gdynia will reach approx.

2 million TEU. It doesn’t mean overcapacity, since all available forecasts anticipate that in 2025 container handling in Gdansk Bay should reach 5 million TEU – 142,5 % growth, compared to 2.061 million TEU in 2014). The enlargement of capacity within Polish ports should create very positive impact to the whole Polish economy and Polish budget.

•

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Innovation

WE MAKE DAILY WORK EASIER “The year 2015 has not ended yet, but it will surely be rated among very successful ones. We continue to expand and are one of Lyreco’s most rapidly growing subsidiaries in Europe,” Piotr Mirosław, President and Managing Director of Lyreco Polska SA, tells Jerzy Bojanowicz.

What does it mean that Lyreco is one of the world’s leaders in providing solutions optimizing purchasing processes?

We are certainly a European leader in supplying workplace products and services. In some parts of the world our position is stronger, in other parts it is a little weaker. We have recently noted a very dynamic expansion in the Asia & Pacific region.

We are focused on stationery and office supplies, that is the products with the distribution of which this business has begun. In 1926, Georges-Gaston Gaspard opened a bookshop in Valenciennes, in northern France. With time, the bookshop expanded and turned into a print shop offering its own stationery. Let me add PM

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that the company, which in 1979 took the name Lyreco, is still in the hands of the Gaspard family.

However, at some point, it broadened its line by products used not only in offices but also other workplaces, like manufacturing sites and warehouses. For several years now we have had a large department offering safety and personal protection equipment. The product range includes protective clothing, specialist gloves, footwear, helmets, safety glasses and reflective clothing. The sales of such products are on the rise, with the revenues growing every year.

Apart from products, which we guarantee to deliver to customers within 24 hours since the order is placed, and top-quality services, we also have a specialist service for large and medium

businesses seeking to optimize their costs of office supplies and safety products.

What does this service consist in?

The experience we have gained, the largescale of our operations and the instruments we have at our disposal enable us to advise purchasing managers or even management boards on how to reorganize purchasing processes and optimize expenditure. As a result, for many customers we are a partner offering not only the wide selection of over 12,000 immediately available products as well as non-catalogue products intended for specific customers, but also the optimization service, which enables a significant reduction in the purchase costs.

PM

Innovation We promote the one-stop-shop concept, which allows customers to reduce the number of suppliers. And this also involves notable benefits.

There are tens of thousands of firms in our customer base and with most of them we have signed cooperation contracts. Of course, we are also constantly attracting new customers.

Lyreco operates in 42 countries. What is Poland’s place among them?

Poland is definitely one of the major markets, especially in Central and Eastern Europe because here we are the leader. In countries, where its position is not as strong, Lyreco cooperates with strategic partners to provide top-quality services to multinational companies, irrespective of where in the world they have their offices.

We have been present in Poland for more than 15 years and we operate independently, working all the time to earn the position of the market’s leader. Lyreco Polska, employing at present nearly 600 people, is one of the larger organizations in the Group. We have a distribution centre of over 24,000 sq m and more than 10 smaller centres used as reloading hubs.

They have a combined space of over 13,000 sq m and support our logistics in the course of order processing. But what is important for our present and potential customers is that each of the over 12,000 products I have already mentioned is always in our main distribution centre ready to be delivered to the customer – to any workplace in Poland - on the next day. Of course, we also have a professional 24/7 online store. Additionally, at the beginning of 2015 we launched a mobile application for smartphones to enable access to our products and services from virtually any place. Consequently, one can say that in terms of the pace of business growth we are among European leaders.

PM

You have more than 1,700 environmentfriendly products in your catalogue. What does that mean?

The environment-friendly products are in keeping with our strategy, which is strongly oriented at corporate social responsibility (CSR), a concept incorporating environment-friendliness. We have developed assessment criteria for these “green” products in conjunction with the Swiss company SGS (Société Générale de Surveillance), which conducts audits certifying the implementation of various standards, for example ISO 14001.

The bar is set very high. The green products are made of easily recyclable materials.

They include plastic bags for offcuts, products with certificates attesting that, for example, the paint used in their production is not toxic, gel pens and paper made with a specified share of waste paper.

PM

Under our five-year strategy adopted in 2012, we try to steadily increase the contribution of these products to our sales. Incidentally, the introduction in 2002 of an integrated system in compliance with both the ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 standards was a natural continuation of our long-term commitment to environmental protection and work safety. Additionally, we also meet OHSAS 18001 standards.

Which of the products you offer would you call exclusive?

The Lyreco brand complements the brandname products from other suppliers in our line, both cheaper and more exclusive. Under the Lyreco Premium brand, we sell products made of materials of higher quality, like for example notebooks with denser paper and a quality cover.

In keeping with our strategy, most of the products sold under the Lyreco brand are medium priced. We do not want them to compete with Premium brands, of which we have many in our line.

PM

How important for Lyreco is the special award the company received in November from the Executive Club in the Outstanding CSR Strategy category?

We treat the distinction we received at the Responsible Business Awards Gala very seriously. It means prestige for us. At the same time, it is one of the several, or perhaps even more than 10, distinctions we have been awarded in the past several years. Among them is the Eko Flota award, which we received in December 2014 and again at the beginning of December 2015, this time for the whole decade, in a competition run by the Polish Vehicle Rental and Leasing Association for the most environment-friendly car fleet in Poland. What allowed us to win the awards is that we had provided training in environment-friendly driving to all our employees who use cars from our fleet and carried out since 2011 a programme to cut carbon dioxide emissions from the fleet cars by 20%, and also that we hold ISO 14001 certification. The experts also took into account that fully electric cars would soon be added to our fleet.

We are very happy that such a well-known organization as the Executive Club, which brings together the largest Polish and international companies and celebrates its 10th anniversary this year, appreciated our strategy and our CSR measures. We are glad that in this category we have found ourselves among the largest firms in Poland.

PM

How does the “Lyreco for Education” programme fit into your strategy?

Under the strategy, we have committed ourselves to supporting the personal development of every person we employ and to taking part PM

in the charity campaigns organized by Lyreco Group. The “Lyreco for Education” programme is such a campaign. Since 2008 Lyreco’s 16 subsidiaries across the world, including the Polish one, have raised money to ensure access to education for children living in the poorest regions of the world. We started with assistance for Bangladesh and in the next years we supported Vietnam, Brazil and Togo. The money we raised, over EUR1.7 million, was transferred to non-governmental organizations, which used it mainly to build 161 schools. In the years 20152018, we will be supporting in this way the poorest areas of Madagascar. Assistance of various kind has already been provided to 1,700 children and 32 schools in the country.

What about your plans?

The plans are very ambitious and, which is very important, we have already started to carry out some of them. Among the most important tasks I was entrusted with a year ago when I was assuming the post of president of Lyreco Polska SA was the company’s further expansion on the Polish market. This requires continuing the diversification of our activities: offering both new products and top-quality services.

This is why, as I have mentioned, apart from office supplies, we are expanding our safety products department. Our line includes catering and hygiene products. Their sales are also growing very rapidly.

In the first half of 2015, we signed a contract to become the exclusive distributor of high quality Nespresso coffee machines and natural coffee portions on the B2B market. The business is growing very dynamically and we have further expansion plans for it.

PM

This means you offer not only punches and staplers, but also “technology.”

Our catalogue is the basic tool in communication with the customers. It contains 16 product categories, including personalized products with the customer’s logo, and electronic products and office machines. Let us include these last products in the technology section, together with telephones, faxes, printers, scanners, shredders, projectors, calculators, displays and various electronic accessories used in offices, like for example data storage devices: CDs, DVDs, USB flash drives and so on. Another category, one of those which expand the fastest, is office furniture. We have desks, standard and conference tables, shelves, a variety of chairs and other pieces of furniture in our catalogue.

As for our plans, we will be pursuing our mission, which is to make daily work easier for our customers, and will be guided by the values shared by the whole Lyreco Group: passion, excellence, respect and agility. They form the foundation on which we want to build our future. • PM

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Innovation

OUR SERVICE

QUALITY HAS BEEN APPRECIATED

Tomasz Szadkowski, President of Soflab Technology Sp. z o.o., talks to Marcin Haber.

You offer a wide range of services in the quality assurance sector. Which of them is your flagship service?

We have never wanted to restrict ourselves, versatility is our advantage. Our mission is to ensure the quality of IT projects in various aspects. One of them is software testing. Another one is testing exposure to Internet threats, something which is called security testing. An important part of our activity, a part we are very proud of, is performance tests, as an element of our customers’ non-functional requirements. Everyone wants correctly functioning and fast applications, which give the user maximum satisfaction from their use.

Thanks to our work with clients and suppliers, we build solutions which are nice, easy to use and first of all very secure. Our competencies have been noticed and appreciated. The British “Test Magazine” has placed us in the list of the world’s 20 Leading Testing Providers. This is a result of our service portfolio and the jobs we have done. We had been assessed for several years and this year we found ourselves among the best in the world. The quality of our services has been recognized and this gives us great satisfaction.

PM

Are your clients mainly Polish firms, or also foreign ones?

We do not restrict ourselves to Poland. We work on many foreign markets. Our clients are companies which use large and complex IT solutions, or develop new IT products. We are valued for not limiting ourselves to checking software quality. For our clients we are a partner who provides complete assistance,

including removing the errors found, optimizing expenditure and helping them to order the right systems from IT system providers. We conduct comprehensive tests, using not only software, but also robots and various electronic controllers and readers. Our task is to find a solution economically justified and useful both for the customer and the enduser, a solution working in the expected way.

Which means your activity goes beyond software tests?

Yes, this is called testing embedded systems, that is systems built into various electronic, or electronic and mechanical devices.

We conduct many tests in the mobile segment, which is now popular. They involve all the devices that we use every day, like for example mobile phones and tablets. We test applications embedded in these devices. We increasingly often use our mobile solutions lab. We are able to check whether an application works correctly with a wide range of devices and operating systems: IOS, Android and Windows Mobile. Consequently, the customer can be sure that the solution will offer comparable experience with using the application in different configurations.

PM

PM

46 polish market

The pace at which the market you are active on develops is closely associated with the development of technology. How to keep up with the pace of change?

As a market leader, we have to be “at the front of the pack” all the time. We use the latest and most effective solutions which are optimal for our customers. This is why we PM

regularly take part in training courses, conferences and discussions with experts across the world. We believe in the simple and universal rule that if people and businesses want to develop they have to learn all the time. You have to broaden your knowledge and build solutions in keeping with trends present on the market. For example, the software-asa-service (SaaS) model is now very popular.

In Poland, we already have several applications of this kind, but in North America and Western Europe such solutions have started to dominate the market. They involve much higher requirements in terms of testing because the whole process is transferred to “the cloud.” The applications have to work with some components which do not fully depend on the customer. The development of solutions able to verify the security of systems in the cloud is now the driving force behind the development of the market and it sets trends. We follow these trends. As endusers, we are very satisfied with such solutions because they are very convenient and relieve us of a lot of duties not directly associated with our core business. As a result, we can focus exclusively on what we are expert at. We appear here in a double role: as a company testing solutions on the one hand and as an end-user who himself uses these solutions quite extensively on the other.

PM

What is the biggest challenge, then? Is it transferring a majority of applications to the cloud, or perhaps technological progress and the need to keep abreast of the hardware?

Innovation

automatically transfers part of the user’s data to the cloud. Our pictures and music are stored partly in our devices and partly in the cloud. We, as end users, may not even notice this at all if we have a fast Internet connection.

Is Polish people’s fear of the cloud at all justified?

In our view, most of the well-known cloud solutions we work with are secure. Many security standards have been developed to convince the end-users that this all functions properly. These standards are much higher than those applied in corporate IT networks. The reason is that something which people fear more has to be better protected.

One should remember that man is always the weakest element of any system. Despite the best safeguards, despite the various systems designed to scatter data so that they are never stored in a single place, and despite modern login methods, there is always the risk that the data will be intercepted because of the end-user’s error. This, however, is beyond the sphere we deal with. The cloud is statistically more secure than the conventional method of storing information in large data bases.

PM

What are Soflab’s plans for the future? Are you going to expand the range of your services, or focus on increasing your competence in the services you already offer?

We are developing on many planes. The first one is technological and methodological progress. The recent years have seen the transformation of our service portfolio from the waterfall model to the agile model, which has gained very high popularity on the market. Polish firms, seeking cost optimization and efficiency in project execution, are also eagerly switching to this model.

Our most important goal now is further expansion on foreign markets. We have already achived a lot in Poland.It is still the most important market for us. But we believe that expanding our portfolio of clients and partners by foreign companies is the biggest chance for our development. The Polish market is quite large in general, but at the same time quite small for niche services. This means we have to expand abroad. We have experience, a good background, and a fantastic modern testing centre equipped with a lab for tests on mobile devices. We have excellent specialists with experience gained on Polish and foreign projects in many sectors.

We hope that, thanks to the effectiveness with which we conduct our projects and their quality, we are able to develop successfully also • on foreign markets.

PM

WE HAVE EXPERIENCE, A GOOD BACKGROUND, AND A FANTASTIC MODERN TESTING CENTRE EQUIPPED WITH A LAB FOR TESTS ON MOBILE DEVICES. Technological progress is balanced in my view. It is noticeable, but I think that people are now accustomed to this pace of change.

They are not surprised that new devices are constantly popping up. Of course, there are companies on the market which respond to this very well and quickly adopt the new solutions. And there are companies which cope a little less successfully. The environment is changing and you have to follow modernity.

Locally, a challenge for Poland is definitely migration to the cloud. The reason is that in our region there is still no confidence in such solutions. There are many fears as to data security. The main fears are associated with data processing and possible access to

the confidential information by undesirable persons. Of course, all this should be examined very carefully. But it seems to me that in coming years there is no return from this direction. It is so convenient that we will all be migrating to the cloud with most of our solutions. It is true that this model has one flaw: all the data is processed in the cloud so if we lose access to our account in the cloud for some reason we may be completely cut off from our data. And this means safeguards are very important. It seems that the cloud is our nearest future, especially considering that most of us use solutions of this kind on a daily basis, though often unknowingly. Today, most smartphones and tablets

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Innovation

THE NORTH VERSUS THE SOUTH Findings of the report “Innovation in SMEs. Under a Magnifying Glass” The southern region is the most innovative part of Poland while businesses based in the north invest the least in innovation, according to findings of the research conducted for the needs of the report “Innovation in SMEs. Under a Magnifying Glass.” How do individual areas of the country come out in the innovation league table and what are the reasons behind the disparities?

T

he southern region, that is the provinces of Małopolskie and Śląskie, tops the innovation league table, which compares individual parts of Poland.

As much as 59% of the businesses surveyed in this region consider themselves to be innovative. The percentage of businesses which view themselves as innovative is only slightly smaller – 55.5% - in the central region, composed of Mazowieckie and Łódzkie provinces. The south-western region – Opolskie and Dolnośląskie provinces - comes third in the league table, with innovative firms accounting for 47.1%. The north-western region – the provinces of Zachodniopomorskie, Lubuskie and Wielkopolskie – is in fourth place, with 46.1% of innovative businesses. The eastern region, consisting of the provinces of Świętokrzyskie, Lubelskie, Podlaskie and Podkarpackie, is second from the bottom of the league table, with 40.3% of innovative firms.

And the northern region, made up of Pomorskie and Zachodniopomorskie provinces, is in the last place, with only 30.4% of businesses saying they are innovative.

“These assessments are not surprising,” says Radosław Kuczyński, president of Europejski Fundusz Leasingowy SA (EFL). “The southern region of our country is where the strongest technical universities operate and where the largest number of manufacturers are active, which is conducive to unconventional solutions. Meanwhile, farming and food processing

48 polish market

dominate in the north and businesses operating in these sectors relatively rarely say they are innovative because they feel the need to invest in innovation less often. I hope that, thanks to new programmes to support innovation, these sectors will also be persuaded to invest in research and development.”

A slightly different picture emerges from a report entitled “Innovative Activity of Businesses in 2011-2013”1 published by the Central Statistical Office (GUS). In the examined period, the biggest percentage of innovative industrial enterprises was in Podlaskie province (more than 24%) and in WarmińskoMazurskie and Podkarpackie provinces (21% each). And as regards businesses providing innovative services, Mazowieckie, Dolnośląskie and Małopolskie provinces had the biggest percentage of them – respectively 16.6%, 15.6% and 13.4%.

However, when examining the innovation performance of businesses, GUS measures it using EU standards on a group of businesses employing from 10 to over 250 people.

The findings are not based on entrepreneurs’ self-assessment and their own definition of innovation.

1 http://stat.gov.pl/obszary-tematyczne/naukai-technika-spoleczenstwo-informacyjne/nauka-itechnika/dzialalnosc-innowacyjna-przedsiebiorstw-wlatach-2011-2013,2,8.html

Europejski Fundusz Leasingowy SA (EFL) was established in 1991 as one of the first leasing companies in Poland. Since 2001 EFL has been a member of Crédit Agricole Group.

This gives EFL financial stability and security and enables it to use the knowledge and experience of an international financial institution. EFL has consistently expanded the range of its solutions for business. The company offers a wide selection of products: leasing, loans, long-term rental, insurance and factoring. For over 24 years EFL has cooperated with the most important producers and suppliers of machines, equipment, vehicles and other fixed assets. The company has been awarded five times with the title of Firm Friendly to the Customer and three times with the title of Financial Brand of the Year. More than 262,000 clients have already chosen EFL to be their business partner. For more see www.efl.pl.

Crédit Agricole Group has debuted on the Polish financial market in 2001. It offers its clients a wide range of financial solutions in the area of banking, leasing, insurance and factoring services. Among the group’s members are Crédit Agricole Bank Polska (former Lucas Bank), EFL Group (EFL, Carefleet, EFL Finance, EFL Service and Eurofactor Polska SA) and Crédit Agricole Ubezpieczenia na Życie SA. For more about Crédit Agricole Polska see www.ca-polska.com.

•

Innovation

MODERN

TECHNOLOGIES

IN ENGINEERING Jarosław Stępniewski, President of PROCHEM S.A.

The company will soon celebrate its 70 years of existence. What is the recipe for success in the construction industry?

PROCHEM is an engineering company, designing and implementing industrial projects, facilities of the general construction and environmental protection. It was established in 1947. Since then, PROCHEM, initially as a design studio and then as an engineering company, has contributed to several thousand investment projects. From the very beginning, we attached great importance to our tools and working methods, upgrading them regularly.

It paid off. PROCHEM is today a strong brand on the engineering and construction market, a reliable partner for large and complex investments both in Poland and abroad. Our biggest asset, besides high qualifications and professionalism, is precisely the use of the most modern tools and working methods.

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PROCHEM has been successively introducing new standards in design.

Since its inception, PROCHEM has set Polish trends in development of design tools. The company was one of the first to perform designs using specialised software, initially AutoCAD®, and in 2002, with AVEVA PDMS™, we entered the era of three-dimensional design in industrial investments. In order to ensure a continuous development and improvement of working methods and tools, in 2012 we decided to start implementing of BIM (Building Information Modeling).

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Is it legitimate to conclude that PROCHEM introduced BIM to the Polish engineering environment?

With the decision to adopt the European good practices in 3D modeling and to adjust them to Polish legal requirements, PROCHEM has developed own modeling standards, which are used in 3D projects. It is a unique 3D modeling environment, combining the best features of the standard modeling tools , i.e. PDMS, Revit or Bocad. Our models are fully active between all engineering disciplines. They also allow the use of BIM approach at every stage of the project, i.e. cost control, scheduling and facility management.

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What are the benefits and opportunities for the company, resulting from the integrated design and the use of BIM? The implementation of 3D software, which is in line with BIM idea, brings to PROCHEM a new quality level in terms of project management PM

and access to design data. 3D modeling of buildings facilitates cooperation between disciplines, allows to avoid collisions or errors, and is leading to increased efficiency, significant shortening of delivery time of documentation. It also helps to shorten the construction time, and to lower investment costs, while it also brings innovations and improvements to the process of facility management.

There are also benefits to the clients of the company, I suppose?

Indeed, the biggest advantage for the investor is access to complete information on work progress and greater control over the expenditure incurred. By using BIM, we are able to meet the expectations of even the most demanding clients, while designing and executing large, complex investments.

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Investing in modern tools brings measurable results, doesn’t it?

Of course. Continuous development, including upgrading of working methods and tools, brings us tangible economic benefits – new contracts for projects requiring extensive knowledge in terms of both expertise and the use of integrated tools, but also awards and prizes. It is encouraging that the quality of services provided by PROCHEM is welcomed and appreciated by the construction market, as confirmed by rewards such as the second place in the Large Pearls category of the Pearls of the Polish Economy.

• PM

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Innovation

THE SCIENCE-BUSINESS

COOPERATION T he lack of cooperation and information flow between research units and businesses, poor talent management and commercialisation challenges - these are some of the problems raised by the participants of the debate “Implementation of Innovative Projects in Poland - Challenges and Barriers” organised by the Polish Press Agency PAP. Prof. Joanna Cygler from the Institute of Innovative Economy Foundation said that what needs to be given a boost was openness of Polish universities to new ideas, funding “from idea to production” and innovation at universities and R&D units.

“The second issue to consider about scientific units is conditions for conducting research. There is much to be done here. The problem is commercialisation of these projects,” she noted. She added that, cooperation aside, it was also problematic to get to the relevant information. “It is about the lack of information about who actually does what,” she said.

Prof. Tadeusz Pietrucha from the National Development Council under the President of the Republic of Poland emphasised that interesting ideas do emerge in scientific circles, and are carried in small and medium-sized enterprises, which are in fact commercialised scientific teams. Inventions cannot be ordered; creating inventions is a process.

Researchers think different than inventors, or entrepreneurs,” he stressed. Eagerness to make contacts with industry is not welcome at universities. “In Poland, there is no tradition of transition from university to industry and vice versa. These environments are closed. Once you quit the academic background, you will have no chance of return. As for businesses, they are not audacious enough to turn to universities for help,” said Prof. Artur Świergiel, National Development Council.

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Herbert Wirth, President of KGHM, said that Poland needed to generate “suction for innovative products.” In his opinion, cooperation between science and business is not bad. He said that should KGHM need a specific device (e.g. for operating reserves), he can hardly imagine “millions” of small companies working for this purpose. Therefore, the Polish cooper giant is creating its own research centre. In his opinion, the problem of innovation in Poland is the lack of trust between people. “It seems to me that we already have the infrastructure, but we have not learnt to work together yet,” he said.

RESEARCH SHOULD IMPROVE LIFE QUALITY Daniel Maksym from the National Centre for Research and Development said research should improve life quality. “If you want to get EU money, it must be an innovative project, it must be a result of cooperation and - which is most importantly – the application is assessed in terms of its economicality. Money is there, it is about learning to apply for it,” she said.

The importance of creating the right atmosphere around innovation was also stressed by Prof. Świergiel. himself will provide political support, because you can truly see commitment to the development of the knowledge-based economy. So, any ideas, concepts and projects will be welcomed. However, quite another issue is whether the government, now and in the future, will actually do it, and whether there will be opportunities,” he concluded.

• Source: PAP

WIELKOPOLSKA CENTRE FOR ADVANCED TECHNOLOGIES

Innovation

BRIDGE BETWEEN SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY Poland’s most modern centre with the goal to develop innovative solutions for industry was opened in an official ceremony on December 1. The Wielkopolska Centre for Advanced Technologies will focus on solutions in the area of chemistry and biology. It is the first undertaking of its kind in Poland created from scratch.

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he Wielkopolska Centre for Advanced Technologies (WCAT) is located in the mid-western city of Poznań on the Adam Mickiewicz University campus in the district of Morasko. The investment project involved erecting and providing with equipment four buildings to house the Centre of Medical Biotechnology with an Animal House, Centre of Industrial and Plant Biotechnology with a Greenhouse, Centre of Chemical Technology and Nanotechnology, and Centre of Materials Science with the Regional Laboratory of Unique Equipment. The Regional Laboratory has highly specialized equipment available for use by the scientific community and small and medium-sized businesses. The Centres are combined with the Service and Technical Facilities, which ensure efficient logistics. The facilities include the Technology Transfer Centre.

The mission of the multidisciplinary Centre designed in this way is to conduct large scientific research and research and development projects as part of European Union’s framework programmes (Horizon 2020) and cooperation with technology platforms, but first of all strategic programmes coordinated and managed by the National Centre for Research and Development (NCBiR) and the National Science Centre (NCN). Additionally, the Centre’s task is to build a bridge between science and industry by focusing on the development of applied research based on the principles similar to those worked out by Fraunhofer institutes in Germany.

WCAT is beginning its operational phase as a multidisciplinary science and technology centre of high international standing and as a research and development centre for innovative firms.

PROF. BOGDAN MARCINIEC,

HEAD OF THE WCAT COORDINATION COMMITTEE

The main objective of WCAT is to be a multidisciplinary centre of high international

Prof. Bogdan Marciniec, head of the WCAT Coordination Committee officially opens the Wielkopolska Centre for Advanced Technologies (WCAT)

standing in the area of high technologies, a centre where projects will be carried out and research programmes developed in conjunction with businesses and other research institutions in the form of specialist research services. In this way, WCAT’s infrastructure, with its technical facilities and qualified staff, will also contribute to the education of future scientists who take master’s and doctoral courses at the universities and institutes making up the WCAT Consortium. The Consortium is composed of five Poznań-based universities: the Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznań University of Technology, Poznań University of Medical Sciences, Poznań University of Life Sciences and Poznań University of Economics; four institutes of the Polish Academy of Sciences: the Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry, of Plant Genetics, of Human Genetics, and of Molecular Physics; the Institute of Natural Fibers and Medicinal Plants; and the Poznań Science and Technology Park of the Adam Mickiewicz University Foundation. It is assumed that 200 to 300 master’s and doctoral students will be involved in WCAT’s work.

Using WCAT as a cooperation platform, they will have an opportunity to do research and establish contact with industry while working on their theses.

WCAT’s multidisciplinary activity will be focused on developing original methods for the selective synthesis of highly processed

chemicals, biochemicals and agrochemicals, called fine chemicals, and a new generation of biomaterials and nanomaterials and their precursors, and then the development of advanced technologies and biotechnologies for the production of these materials, with the aim of using them in optoelectronics, medicine, pharmacy, agriculture, ceramics and many high-tech industries.

The research will also be aimed at creating a technological basis for a number of applications for bioorganic chemistry and biotechnology in healthcare, that is molecular and cellular therapies and medical diagnostics, as well as applications in agricultural engineering and in the food industry. There is huge interest from Poznań’s and Poland’s scientific community and from industrial research centres in collaboration with WCAT, which is reflected in the over 50 research projects that are already carried out, or are to be carried out using the resources made available by the Centre. Close international collaboration has already been established at this initial stage.

Also very important is the high intensity of preparatory work conducted with more than 10 small, medium and large businesses from across Poland to agree on joint research and development projects. Their character will correspond with the needs of the businesses and the unique capabilities of the Centre. •

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Economy

PO LISH ECON O MY I N 2015 MOR E SE C U R I T Y FO R T H E STAT E, M O R E E N E R G Y SEC URI T Y FO R T H E E CO N O MY

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ccording to economic experts, public administration (finance and economy ministries, GUS and NBP) and world economic organisations (OECD), Poland’s GDP growth in 2015 will amount to around 3.4-3.5% against the previous year. This rate is expected to remain at a similar level in 20162017. The year 2015 marked the implementation of another phase of the programme of restructuring the armed forces, which will cost an estimated PLN 130 million until 2022.

High-performance units are being built in coal-fired power plants, which will greatly contribute to improving the energy balance of the country. The construction of the LNG terminal in Świnoujście is nearing completion.

Whether the GDP growth is sufficient as it stand now depends on the point of view.

For the previous PO-PSL government, the GDP growth was a reason for pride, especially compared to other EU countries. The incumbent PiS government point out that for a country moving its way up that Poland still is, the rate is too low to allow it to quickly catch up, with the countries of the “old” EU-15 in terms of development level. Meanwhile, EU funding will be helpful. Under the present EU financial plan, tens of billions of euros will be spent by the end of the decade, primarily on investment projects in infrastructure and ICT industry. Although successive sections of expressways and motorways were completed in 2015, and the modernisation of the strategic Warsaw-Łódź rail line is to be completed by the end of December, it is already known that not all the investment plans of GDDKiA and PKP PLK will be realised before 2020.

OECD has the following projections regarding the major economic indicators for Poland in 2015: GDP growth rate: 3.5%, inflation rate -0.8%, unemployment rate: 7.6% (measured according to EU standards), general government deficit: 2.8%, public debt: 51.5% (as defined by Maastricht).

FINANCE AND BANKING The persistent spell of deflation means that the Monetary Policy Council maintains low interest rates. As a result, deposit interest rates are almost close to zero. According to Kuba Karliński from Magmillon, a consultancy, in the period from March to June 2015 Poles withdrew deposits worth approx. PLN 5 billion. But in the following months, they continued to save money in banks.

From January to September 2015 banks and cooperative banks granted 144.6 thousand. mortgage loans for a total amount of

Economy PLN 30.7 billion, i.e. 2.9% less in terms of number and 1.4% less in value terms than a year earlier.

The last months of the outgoing government saw a drop in the official unemployment rate to a single-digit level (slightly under 10%), as well as a stabilisation of deflation as already mentioned. Last year also brought a serious threat to the deposit guarantee system (Bank Guarantee Fund) protecting clients of financial institutions in the event of bankruptcy. This was due to the collapse of two cooperative banks: SKOK Wołomin and SK Wołomin. BFG had to pay out nearly PLN 5 billion to their clients, and of course only deposits up to the equivalent of EUR 100 thousand were covered by the guarantee scheme.

Financial institutions as well as large format retail chains are already concerned with the plans by the PiS government to impose new taxes on both sectors. They suggest that excessive fiscal stringency of the state can lead to bankruptcy of some banks or supermarkets, and some experts warn that both sectors will pass the cost of new taxes onto clients by increasing prices of goods and services.

NOT ONLY COAL According to former deputy Economy Minister Jerzy Pietrewicz, who spoke at the “Eco Energy Summit 2015” in October, the Polish energy sector and whole economy must make the low-carbon shift. Although coal and lignite will remain the basic fuel for power generation, their share will be diminishing for the benefit of renewables and nuclear energy.

The energy security of Poland remained a matter of concern throughout 2015. The heatwave and temporary limitations of power supply in August showed that in emergency circumstances the country’s power transmission system does not fully cover demand.

Therefore, the challenges ahead for the coming years include replacing old and wornout coal-fired power units with modern and low-emission ones, building a nuclear power plant, as well as completing the LNG terminal in Świnoujście. In 2015 new generating units were built in Opole. The construction of power units is also under way in, among others, Stalowa Wola (gas unit - PGNiG/Tauron), Włocławek (gas unit - PKN Orlen), Łagisza (steam and gas unit) and Kozienice (coal unit - ENEA). Power plants are also further developed in Turów (lignite) and Jaworzno (coal).

The Opole power plant is Poland’s largest industrial investment since 1989, amounting to PLN 11.56 billion, with two new coal-fired power units. By 2020, Polish companies will invest in the power sector more than PLN 114

billion, within a few years Poland will have a total of 5,000 MW of new generation capacity, accounting for approx. 12% of the country’s demand.

Unfortunately, the construction of a nuclear power plant has hardly moved forward over 2015. Despite the project being on for several years, even the plant’s location has not been established yet and its coming online will probably be further delayed. There is no question it will be operational by the end of the decade.

The past year also saw a major slowdown, if not an outright suspension, in the exploration of shale gas deposits. The exploration was supposed to lead to shale gas use on industrial scale. Foreign operators were successively pulling out, leaving Polish stateowned companies (including PGNiG and PKN Orlen) almost alone. Test drillings were almost brought to a stop. Experts say that, given the results of the drillings carried out so far, there are no indications that the exploitation of the shale gas deposits would be sufficiently profitable. One reason is that Polish shale gas deposits are much deeper than American ones, which boosts production costs. The months-long plunge in oil and gas prices is to blame, too.

An important investment project, improving the country’s energy security through a greater diversification of energy sources, is the construction of the LNG terminal in Świnoujście, which is now close to completion after several years of delays. Polskie LNG, a state-owned operator of the facility, announced that the first test delivery will be handled on 11 December, with the terminal expected to be fully operational in May 2016.

The LNG terminal in Świnoujście will have a capacity of 5 billion cubic metres of gas per year, an equivalent of one-third of the country’s demand, now covered mostly from Russian imports. In the future, the facility can be expanded to be able to handle 7.5 billion cubic metres of the “blue fuel.”

ANOTHER YEAR OF IMPLEMENTING THE ARMED FORCES’ MODERNISATION PROGRAMME In the face of the ongoing Russian aggression of eastern Ukraine and the Crimea and a surge in terrorist attacks orchestrated by the so-called Islamic State, strengthening the defence capacity of Poland has become 12/2015 polish market

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Economy a matter of pressing concern. It has recently been legislated that the annual defence spending must constitute no less than 2% of GDP, a threshold that is likely to be further increased in the future. In addition to continuous development, the Polish armed forces are under the multiannual modernisation programme 2013-2022 that will cost a total of PLN 130 billion. Within its framework, PITRADWAR, a Polish military manufacturer, was commissioned by the Defence Ministry Inspectorate of Armaments to supply the Polish army with 77 self-propelled anti-aircraft missile sets “Poprad” equipped with rocket launchers “Grom” by 2021. The Polish government adopted the recommendation made by the Ministry of Defence regarding the selection of the Patriot anti-aircraft and missile defence system, within the scope of the air defence programme, known as “Wisła.”

Huge controversy arose over a tender for the delivery of 50 multipurpose helicopters (initially there was talk of 70 such aircraft), which was won by French-German Airbus, the manufacturer of the helicopter EC-725 Caracal. Airbus’s competitor PZL-Świdnik filed a complaint with the court demanding compensation. Before the October parliamentary elections, Antoni Macierewicz, the incumbent defence minister, did not rule out the cancellation of the tender. In the coming years, another tender will be open for the supply of a yet-unknown number of assault helicopters,

and as early as in 2016 a tender will be announced for the supply of three submarines (along with weapons and logistics and training package) of launchers missiles. France’s DCNS and Germany’s TKSM are the two largest shipyards bound to fiercely compete.

ICT “The ICT sector accounts for 7.5% of Polish exports and 3% of jobs. It is also one of the most innovative sectors of the Polish economy,” former deputy Minister of Economy Arkadiusz Bąk told reporters in September 2015, commenting on the forecasts that ICT will have a share of between 9 and 15% in Poland’s GDP by 2020. Poland will receive over EUR 80 billion in EU funds from now until 2020, a significant portion of which will go to the ICT sector. More than EUR 8 billion were earmarked for digitisation of the country under the Digital Poland Programme, but projects related to information and communication technologies will be supported from virtually all national and regional programmes because it is almost impossible to find a sphere of the economy, for which the ICT sector would not be a service provider. Of 19 fields of Polish smart specialisation there is not a single one that would not use modern technologies.

•

LESZEK GRABARCZYK, deputy director of the National Centre for Research and Development: “ICT is an extremely diverse and one of the most dynamically developing industries. This is largely due to innovation. Let’s remember that in 20102013 the ICT sector’s R&D expenditure has almost doubled and ICT companies innovated almost three times more often than companies from the manufacturing and service sector. As suggested by the findings of the report “Cost-effectiveness of investing in research and development”, which we conducted together with PwC, the ICT sector – right behind the chemical and pharmaceutical industries (47.33%), and production of machines and vehicles (45.66%) – accounts for the largest percentage of revenues from R&D results in operating income (25.24%).

Although we do not have the data for 2015 yet, it can be expected that the ICT sector will remain one of the leaders when it comes to R&D spending, which will result in its further development and greater share in GDP, which is now approx. 8%. Importantly, the growing demand for technologically advanced products and services in the area of ​​ICT prompts the emergence of new businesses – including start-ups – investing in research and development leading to the creation of innovative solutions, both on the Polish market and globally. It is worth noting that ICT’s growth was possible also thanks to investments in higher ​​ education that multiplied the number of graduates majoring in fields of particular importance for the ICT sector.”

Patryk Mirecki

THERE IS HOPE THAT IT WILL BE EASIER IN 2016 Prof. Henryk Skarżyński, Director of the World Hearing Centre and the Institute of Physiology and Pathology of Hearing

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ndoubtedly, the new year is always welcomed with the hope that it will be better than the previous one. This applies to virtually everything around us. With the new government and the new parliament

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there is hope that it will be easier to get to specialists in different areas of medicine, that long queues will shorten. The new management of the ministry of health has a chance to provide effective responses to many problems. It is to be hoped that most of the plans will materialise, because it would be better for each of us as patients or potential patients. In the health policy of the state, if no additional cash injection is made, every achievement should be considered a success. Among the many tasks ahead for the next year, I can see three priority ones: 1. The first priority is taking concrete steps to ensure education of future nurses. Deficiencies are already evident, and the needs of an aging population for nursing care will only grow.

Even the best equipment will not replace the nursing personnel.

2. The second priority is the systematic introduction of universal screenings across populations. The results should be the basis for planning expenditure and evaluating social needs.

Screenings on such a scale is a real prevention that we must afford.

3. The third priority is a constructive review of the existing system, including healthcare programmes such as the oncology package. Only appropriate conclusions will allow to work out better solutions.

The Ministry of Health is led by the people who have been long involved in the Polish health service at its various levels. A lot of good things can certainly be done, but it will also depend on all of us – on the commitment of health personnel and on each of us, Poles, taking care of our health.

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2016

Economy

RIGHT TO WITHDRAW FROM DISTANCE CONTRACTS

Anna Stasiak-Apelska, director of the Warsaw office of the Gajewski Trawczyńska i Wspólnicy law firm

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he article concerns the way of concluding distance contracts, with the exclusive use of one or more means of distance communication up to and including the time when the contract is concluded, according to the new regulations introduced by the consumer rights law which entered into force on December 25, 2014.

The change to the national regulations resulted from the need to implement the provisions of the consumer rights directive (Directive 2011/83/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of October 25, 2011). At present, three conditions have to be met to conclude a binding contract by telephone or another means of distance communication, or to buy goods from an online store: the content of the contract has to be confirmed in written form (on paper or another medium), the consumer has to state in written form his will to conclude the contract and the statement of the consumer’s will has to be confirmed.

Importantly, the consumer has the right to withdraw from the contract within 14 days after acquiring physical possession of the goods without giving any reason. In the case when goods are delivered separately, in multiple lots or pieces, the period is appropriately modified.

The consumer also has the right of withdrawal from service contracts and contracts for the delivery of digital media or content. In this case, the beginning of the withdrawal period is counted from the day when the contract has been concluded. In the case of ordering the subscription of the printed version of

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a magazine, the 14-day period is counted from the day when the consumer has received the first copy of the magazine.

It should be noted that in the case of goods purchase the withdrawal period starts on the day after the goods have been delivered. And in the case of a service contract the period starts on the day after the contract has been concluded. Additionally, if the last day of the withdrawal period falls on a legal holiday, Saturday or Sunday the withdrawal period expires at the end of the following working day.

It is important for the trader to inform the consumer that he has the right to withdraw from the contract within 14 days. Otherwise, the withdrawal period expires 12 months after the end of the 14-day period. However, if the consumer has been provided with the information on the withdrawal right before the expiry of the initial 14-day period the withdrawal period expires 14 days after the information has been provided to the consumer.

In the case of withdrawal from a distance contract, the contract is regarded as not having been concluded. If the consumer has informed the trader of the decision to withdraw from the contract before the trader has accepted his offer the offer ceases to be binding. The withdrawal is effected by notifying the trader about the decision to withdraw on an official form or by any other written notice.

The trader has to reimburse all payments received from the consumer, including the costs of delivery, not later than 14 days from the day of receiving the consumer’s statement on

withdrawal from the contract. The trader should use the same means of payment as the consumer unless the consumer has expressly agreed to be reimbursed in a different way and on condition that such reimbursement does not involve any costs for the consumer. Importantly, the trader has the right to withhold the reimbursement until he has received the goods back, or until the consumer has supplied evidence of having sent the goods back.

Apart from the obligation to reimburse the value of the goods sent back by the consumer, the trader is also obliged to reimburse the cost of the cheapest method of delivery he offers.

This means that the trader is not obliged to reimburse supplementary costs incurred by the consumer.

In turn, the consumer is required to send back the goods or hand them over to a person authorized by the trader not later than 14 days from the day of withdrawal from the contract unless the trader has offered to collect the goods himself. The consumer bears only the direct costs of returning the goods unless the trader has agreed to bear them, or failed to inform the consumer prior to concluding the contract that the consumer has to bear them.

The tightening of the requirements which have to be met to conclude a binding distance contract and the rights given to the consumer are designed to ensure broadly understood consumer protection, including ensuring the transparency of contracts concluded in this way and making it easier to prove the ultimate content of the contract concluded.

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2015

Economy

A TIME OF INTENSIVE SEARCH FOR NEW MARKETS AND BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES

The end of the year is a natural time to draw conclusions. An interview with Sylwia Mikołajczyk, President of Petrax Sp. z o.o.

What can you tell us about 2015 year? Has it been successful?

The answer to this question requires deeper reflection and is complex. What can I say about 2015 year? Certainly it has been a year full of challenges but it is natural in these times and the industry we operate in. The legislature and audit bodies have ensured that we have not been bored and the situation on the world oil markets has made our everyday business reality even more “attractive.”

2015 year has been another good year for Petrax, but this is something we have got used to. For 17 years the company has been consistently building its brand value on welldefined markets. At the same time, we are always looking for new solutions and ideas, and strive to improve all aspects of our business. For many years, the company’s revenues has attained similar levels, oscillating around PLN 750 million, allowing us to generate solid and stable profits. A peculiar competition has been rife in our industry for generating/ publishing ever higher revenues, with no regard for margin value but this is not our idea for business. Stable revenues and profit optimisation is what I subscribe to as President of the Board.

The year 2015 was also a time of intensive search for new markets and business opportunities, including the launch of several PM

interesting projects. Our team does not like boredom, and we do not let them get bored.

I must add that this year has given us a lot to think about. I do not want to be misunderstood, but the situation of entrepreneurs operating in the petrochemical industry in Poland is a nightmare. We have got used to the fact that we are treated like criminals, as any private company in our country. We have got used to constant legislative changes; we have even resigned ourselves to the fact that it is up to us to do intelligence and investigative work and to watch our customers. It is a problem having dozens of inspections a year and one board member on a permanent secondment for this purpose - still, it can be dealt with. But there comes a realisation, a terrible thought that we, private entrepreneurs, maintaining this country, giving employment to its nationals, are unwanted. This is really depressing and devastating to the morale of the team.

Sounds fearsome…

No, it was my goal, I have just summed up the year.

PM

sentence: “We simplify things that are unworkable for others”, to constantly look for new opportunities, to be at the forefront of its industry, as embedded in our DNA. The ideas I have mentioned above result from our business philosophy. Knowing how we work at Petrax, the European petrochemical market players, our contractors, often even competitors - yes, competitors - come to us with ideas, suggestions for joint implementation and questions. These are the bright moments in our daily life. Our new projects - not to reveal too much at this stage - involve the creation of new product groups and the use of innovative sales channels. Initial results have been more than promising.

What can I wish you and your company in the coming year?

The answer is simple - a stable, unambiguous legal framework and the smallest possible presence of the state in the economy. We • will handle the rest.

PM

You mentioned some new, interesting business projects. Would you lift the veil of secrecy?

It is natural that Petrax, whose business advantage can be summarised in the following PM

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Economy

A YEAR OF CHANGE IN THE POLISH BANKING SECTOR Prof. Małgorzata Zaleska, Director of the Institute of Banking, Warsaw School of Economics (SGH), President of the Committee on Financial Sciences, Polish Academy of Sciences (PAN)

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he year 2015 in the Polish banking sector was extremely eventful.

I would even dare to say that it resembled the classic Alfred Hitchcock films: first came an earthquake, then the tension mounted up, and eventually it looks as if there is a chance for a happy ending. It all started with the decision of the Swiss National Bank, in January, to cease protecting the exchange rate of the Swiss franc to the euro against excessive appreciation. This resulted in a year-long struggle to solve the problem of mortgage loans denominated in the swiss franc and help Polish “Swiss franc victims”. After a few twists, it now seems to be that by the end of the year or early next year it will be possible to reach a compromise, which will be acceptable for most of those affected and will not undermine the financial stability of Poland.

From the point of view of bank clients, one significant change was appointment of the Financial Ombudsman in place of the Insurance Ombudsman. The Financial Ombudsman provides advice, investigates complaints and requests of clients dissatisfied with financial services offered to them and mediates between financial institutions (banks) and their clients, increasing chances for extra-judicial dispute resolution.

It is also worth noting an improved protection of the users of banking services, for example by placing a cap on non-interest loan costs. The maximum amount of loan interest was changed from 4 times the lombard rate into 7% plus 2 times the NBP reference rate.

This is particularly important in relation to credit cards, because the maximum interest rate usually applies to them.

For borrowers, the decision was also important to abolish the bank enforcement title (BTE), which put at an advantage banks enforcing unpaid debts on loans.

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THE PROFIT MADE BY BANKS IN 2015 WAS STILL HIGH, ALBEIT LOWER THAN IN PREVIOUS YEARS. The year (November) brought an unpleasant surprise to clients of one of the largest co-operative banks - SK Bank in Wołomin.

The Polish Financial Supervisory Authority suspended the operations of the bank, and its guaranteed deposits will be paid out by the Bank Guarantee Fund (BFG). This is the first bankruptcy in the Polish banking sector in 15 years. The reasons for bank failures remain unchanged over time: fundamental

errors in credit risk management spawn very high losses.

At the same time, the cooperative banking sector is undergoing important institutional changes which are meant to reaffirm its position. The process of strengthening cooperation between cooperative banks and greater integration of associations was launched with the creation of the Institutional Protection Scheme (IPS). This means that it will be possible to manage liquidity and solvency at a group level rather than at a single bank level as it was the case previously.

As for other institutional changes, the macro-prudential supervision was established in Poland after lengthy discussions and with delay. Its mission is to prevent macroeconomic imbalances, including conducting countercyclical policy. Thus a body was formed that will look at the economy and the financial sector from a bird’s-eye view. The cooperation between that body, the government and the central bank is therefore highly desirable.

Let’s keep in mind that throughout 2015 banks operated in an environment of low interest rates, making it difficult to achieve a high net interest income. They tried to compensate losses by running up fees and commissions. The profit made by banks in 2015 was still high, albeit lower than in previous years.

The year 2016 will also certainly be packed with events and changes. One of the anticipated changes is the introduction of a banking tax, which will probably be charged on assets.

This will allow to boost the national budget revenues, and thereby increase the input of banks, including foreign, to the development of Poland’s economy. Increasing the ancillary role of banks in the economy will certainly be one of the major points on the agenda for discussion and action in the Polish banking • sector.

Infrastructure

BREAKING DOWN BARRIERS TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF POLISH INFRASTRUCTURE

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he 3rd edition of the Infrastructure Investment Forum was held in the Westin Hotel in Warsaw on 19 November 2015. The unique form of the debate, which was attended by eminent political and business figures, reconfirmed the strength of dialogue, bringing about new ideas. The event was organised by MMC Polska and its guest of honour was Anna Streżyńska, Minister of Digitisation.

The presidency of the Forum’s Programme Council was entrusted to Dariusz Kacprzyk, President of Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego (BGK), who delivered an opening address: “The development of infrastructure, which is pretty obvious, is essential for the process of economic growth and for entrepreneurs.

Evidently, infrastructure projects vary as to the bearing they have on the success of an industry or a company. However, there are investments which are of great importance for

Dariusz Kacprzyk, President of Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego (BGK)

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everyone, namely ICT, road, rail and energy infrastructure. The cost of access to ICT services, energy and transportation often determine whether your business is competitive or not. A report published by Deloitte in October shows that Poland’s demand in terms of infrastructure will be worth over PLN 310 billion by 2020. Most of that amount will certainly be allocated to road, rail and energy infrastructure, while many other investments - including municipal - presenting opportunities in terms of absorption of EU funds are simply very important. Market needs are large, and in the context of these needs we have managed - as the Forum’s Programme Council - to identify several limitations resulting from the specifics of this market. Five or seven-years’ long funding is already considered relatively long, while in fact investment projects often require a funding process as long as twenty years. We are facing a big challenge and we need to figure out how to address these needs. In this context, we should say about the Junker Plan, that is the European strategic investment plan, which receives a lot of interest, but has not been laid out sufficiently. It is also an opportunity to define the role of the national development bank, which is BGK in this respect.”

The future of Polish infrastructure was discussed by Prof. Jerzy Hausner, Jerzy Gajewski President of NDI, Dariusz Zawadka, VicePresident of PERN Przyjaźń SA, Alessandro Carano of the European Commission, Marcin Chmielewski, Vice-President of KGHM Polska Miedź, Michał Gramatyka Vice-President of Tauron Polska Energia SA and other speakers.

The major issue discussed was the development of Poland’s infrastructure as one of

the pillars of the country’s economic development. How to ensure the synchronisation of public and private investment; where and how decisions should be made; and what the allocation of investment risks between private and public operators should be - these are just some of the questions addressed. The speakers touched upon the Juncker Plan referred to by Dariusz Kacprzyk opening the conference. They also reflected on the sources of funding for infrastructure investment projects, including on the PPP model and its efficiency in Poland, as well as on positive examples to follow. Development always involves overcoming obstacles, hence much attention was paid to the impact of the planned legislative changes on investments, and to legislation that determines the effectiveness of the investment process.

The Forum was held under the Honorary Patronage of the Ministry of Administration and Digitisation, General Directorate for National Roads and Motorways, PPP Centre and Polish Association of Construction Employers.

The Polish economy is now undergoing extensive modernisation, especially in the area of broadly understood infrastructure.

However, it should be based on the most stable and predictable fundamentals, reflecting a clear and long-term vision. The Infrastructure Investment Forum creates the muchneeded unique platform for market practitioners, public administration and local governments as well as all those working on legal and systemic solutions, or making concrete investment decisions, to exchange views and share experiences.

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Innovation

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Infrastructure

TRANSPORTATION. THE CURRENT STATE AND PROSPECTS FOR DEVELOPMENT

On 23 November, the University of Technology and Humanities in Radom hosted, at its Main Hall, the debate “Transportation. The Current State and Prospects for Development.” The debate was intended to discuss and assess the operation of the following modes of transport: road, rail, air, inland waterways, shipping, and the role of transportation in international relations. Its organisers were Prof. Henryk Skarżyński, President of the Foundation - Academy of Polish Success, and Prof. Zbigniew Łukasik, Rector of the University of Technology and Humanities in Radom.

Prof. Janusz Dyduch, President of the Association of Engineers and Technicians of Transportation Delivering an introductory speech, Prof. Janusz Dyduch, President of the Association of Engineers and Technicians of Transportation, said: The experience of recent years has confirmed that the insufficient development of transport infrastructure is one of the most important factors inhibiting the development of Poland.

Polish transportation policy is geared towards individual short-term objectives and, consequently, is characterised by the absence of a long-term vision for development. The source of these problems is primarily a deficit of forward-thinking in the decision-making process.

As representatives of the scientific community, we are deeply concerned over the lack of measures aimed at solving the existing transportation problems and creating conditions facilitating the country’s development in other areas.

The key factors of transportation development: 1. Transport influences all the areas of the country’s development. The size, scope, range and degree of transportation development is one of the main factors determining the level of economic development of the country. Likewise, transport infrastructure has a direct effect on the GDP growth and international competitiveness of the country.

2. The proper development of transport infrastructure requires world-class scientific research. This is necessary both to ensure the proper use of infrastructure and to develop development directions and appropriate quality of transport infrastructure.

3. The next 20 years will be a period of intensive development of transportation in the world and in Europe, with high-speed railways, motorways, air traffic and a new generation of vehicles. If no research is conducted, it will mean a rupture of dialogue with the world, a gap that will be impossible to close.

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4. There are scientific resources in Poland which, if suitably managed, would make it possible to conduct research on a par with highly-developed EU countries and co-create infrastructure compatible with theirs. If the problem is neglected, scientists will turn to other disciplines, and in a few years’ time research teams will simply cease to exist.

5. Poland is in a quite comfortable situation with relatively large structural funds from the European Union at its disposal, which can be allocated to research on transportation. It should be considered that the Common Transport Policy is one of the priorities of the European Union, and infrastructure development in the area of transportation networks, particularly highspeed rails, is cited among the primary goals for the coming years.

6. Transportation development should be ahead of the national and regional economic growth, responding to the increasing transportation demand, not to inhibit economic development in a sense that conducting business means greater transportation needs. An increase in demand for transportation and its quality improvement is inextricably linked with social and economic development.

7. The necessary, massive investment in transportation, changing the look of Poland, cannot be made without the backing of world-class research and education, and good teaching must be based on quality research. The implementation of social and economic goals is conditional upon the ability to generate research projects that bring added value, covering the following specific objectives: development of smart transportation systems and implementation of ICT technologies, which will allow to reduce the number of the means of transport in service and increase the efficiency of urban and suburban transport and the safety of users, while

meeting environmental protection standards.

Urban utilities are important too: water supply, sewerage, waste water management and waste management, power grids and Internet, recreational and shopping facilities. Other important social and economic objectives include the development and implementation of modern means of modernisation of road infrastructure and technological basis for high-speed rails.

8. Increasing road traffic caused by heavy vehicles, growing expectations of road users, as well as expectations of road managers in terms of durability of infrastructure make it urgent to carry out studies whose implementation will enable the modernisation of the worn-out road infrastructure in Poland. It is necessary to develop prefabricates for redesigning engineering structures, sustainable materials for the reconstruction of road surfaces, new materials, products and solutions to improve the safety of road users. In order to diagnose the condition of infrastructure methods measuring the actual impact of heavy vehicles on the road infrastructure should be used. New materials and technologies for the modernisation of bridges (including antique) should also be subject to studies.

10. Ensuring an effective strategy for transport development in Poland requires the adoption of a programme of specific development actions in individual transport areas, based on the existing studies, often inconsistent in substance, and new analyses. The programme should consist of about a hundred specific projects according to a scheme - what, who, where, how much and at what time. Such programmes would cover a time horizon of a minimum of 10 years.

A good example of a similar initiative in Europe which ended in success is the programme for the Swedish railway modernisation designed in the 1980s.

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Infrastructure

WE’RE TAKING THE FUTURE INTO OUR OWN HANDS Mariusz Buława, MSc in Electronics, ETI Departament, Gdańsk University of Technology; Mastère Spécialisé en Télécommunications et Transfert de Technologie Est/Ouest, Telecom Bretagne (France); PhD in Technical Sciences, Transportation Department, Warsaw University of Technology. He co-authored a number of technological solutions and implementations in the field of diagnostics and rail automation in Poland and abroad. In 1989-1993, a research and teaching assistant at the Gdańsk University of Technology. Since 1991, he has been with voestalpine SIGNALING Sopot (formerly TENS Sp. z o.o.) as a designer, project manager, technical and commercial director, and since 2009 as President of the Board; since 2011, President of the Board of voestalpine Railway Systems Polska (formerly VAE Polska).

voestalpine SIGNALING Sopot Sp. z o.o. offers and implements innovative systems to support railway transport.

ASDEK system - detection of rolling stock failures during operation; axle counting systems UniAC1 - control of unoccupancy of individual track sections and turnouts; SARPO and TENSAR systems - automatic railway car marshalling control; HADIAG and TENSAN systems - support of production, maintenance and repair of the rolling stock; SPHEROLOCK - hermetic locking system, HYDROLINK and HYDROSTAR systems - railway turnout technology.

voestalpine Railway Systems Polska Sp. z o.o. supplies, since 2001, turnouts and turnout components for PKP PLK infrastructure, including high-speed turnouts, and most recently also rails and tongue rails for rail and urban rail transport.

Receivers of our products in Poland are PKP PLK, general contractors of rail infrastructure projects and manufacturers of turnouts.

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Infrastructure

NEWAG, A COMPANY-MEMBER OF THE SOUTHERN RAILWAY CLUSTER, IS THE WINNER OF THE EUROPEAN EDITION OF ERCI INNOVATION AWARDS 2015

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he Southern Railway Cluster has come out with the initiative and recommended that the European ERCI Innovation Awards 2015 be granted according to the criteria of product innovation. With 10 European railway clusters - BTS Railway Industry Cluster Saxony (Germany), CNA Cluster Bahntechnik Bavaria (Germany), i-Trans (France), Berlin Partner für Wirtschaft und Technologie GmbH (Germany), Rail Alliance (United Kingdom), Railgrup (Spain), RTCA Railway Technology Cluster Austria (Austria), Southern Railway Cluster (Poland), DITECFER (Italy) and Jarnvag Klustret (Sweden) - it is the companies recommended by the Polish, German and French clusters that received the awards.

The Jury assessed the level of the project’s innovation, how the company’s competitive advantage is strengthened, and whether the innovation is the result of work in an organised network of operators.

Newag SA, a company-member of the Southern Railway Cluster, has received the award for the project “The first European 6-axis multi-system electric locomotive for heavy freight trains com-pliant with TSI manufactured in Poland”, carried out with the support of National Centre for Research and Development (NCBR). Newag SA is one of the oldest railway companies in Poland, with many years of experience in modernisation and production of rolling stock, manufacturing of trams and subway cars. Managed to the highest standards, the company takes great care of the quality of its products and services, which gives it a stable and exceptionally strong position on the market of locomotives in Poland.

The international Jury considered three aspects: the level of the project’s innovation, how the company’s competitive advantage is strengthened, and whether the innovation is the result of work in an organised network of operators. The organisers – the European Railway Cluster Initiative – invited rail experts from across Europe to form the competition’s Jury, including one Pole - Prof. Jerzy Mikulski specialising in transport telematics and automation of transportation processes.

In this year’s, first edition of the competition, which aims to promote innovations introduced by European companies from the railway sector, awards have been presented in two categories: ERCI Innovation Awards for large

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From left: Adam Jabłoński, DSc, Eng., Vice-President of the Association of Southern Railway Cluster, Dawid Szkucik of Newag S.A., Adam Turowski of Newag S.A., Marek Jabłoński, PhD, President of the Association of Southern Railway Cluster, and Prof. Jerzy Mikulski. enterprises and ERCI Innovation Awards for small and medium-sized enterprises.

The winners of the SME category: Witt Industrie Elektronik (Germany) and SMTC (France), received the award for integrating an electromagnetic transducer with a sandwich-like panel, resulting in the development of a panoramic loudspeaker invisible for passengers.

“We are proud that a member of the Southern Railway Cluster has won an award in such a prestigious competition.

We are also very pleased that Polish innovation has been recognised by an international Jury of respectable experts.” said Marek Jabłoński, PhD, President of the Association of Southern Railway Cluster and Adam Jabłoński, PhD, Vice President of the Association of Southern Railway Cluster.

The awards were presented during the BCN RAIL fair in Barcelona, the most important international railway event in southern Europe.

The Awards Ceremony of the next edition of ERCI Innovation Awards will be held at the INNOTRANS 2016 in Berlin. We hope that other Polish companies will also be • granted awards.

Export

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km/h

PIERWSZY POLSKI POCIĄG POSIADAJĄCY PEŁNE TSI ZGODNE Z NAJNOWSZYMI R E S T RY KC YJ N Y M I N O R M A M I U N I I E U R O P E J S K I E J .

Najszybszy skonstruowany i wyprodukowany w Polsce pojazd szynowy.

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Economy

14TH CONGRESS OF POLISH EXPORTERS POLISH MARKET’S KRYSTYNA WOŹNIAKTRZOSEK WINS THE TITLE OF ECONOMIC JOURNALIST OF THE YEAR 2015 The 14th Congress of Polish Exporters was held in the Ministry of Development on 19 November. The gala and the ceremony of consecration of the Banner of the Polish Exporters Association were organised by the Polish Exporters Association under the patronage of the Minister of the Economy, Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development and Marshals of Regions.

The leading theme of the 14th Congress of Polish Exporters was the development of Polish exports in the context of the EU financial period for 2014-2020. The subject was chosen to provide exporters with detailed information on the use of EU funds for the purpose of innovation-oriented and export-oriented economic development.

The aim of the 14th Congress of Polish Exporters was further deepening the ties and cooperation between exporters and relevant ministries and Departments of Trade and Investment Promotion at Polish embassies abroad, with a view to promoting exports as a driving force of economic growth.

In his opening speech, Stefan Tkaczyk, President of the Central Council of the Association of Polish Exporters, read out a letter from President Andrzej Duda addressed to the participants of the Congress and all Polish exporters.

Agnieszka Buła-Kopańska, Director of the Support Instruments Department in the Ministry of the Economy, presented the report on the application of EU funds in 2014-2020 in the process of building an innovation-oriented and export-oriented economy. The activities of the Ministry of the Economy and Polish embassies’ Departments of Trade and Investment Promotion aimed at promoting Polish exports and foreign expansion of enterprises were presented by: Wojciech Pobóg-Pągowski, Director of the Department of Promotion and Bilateral Cooperation in the Ministry of the Economy; Jacek Robak, Minister-Counsellor, Head of the Investment Promotion Section in the Polish Embassy in Berlin; Henryk Szymański, Minister-Counsellor, Head of the Investment Promotion Section in the Polish Embassy in Vilnius; Tomasz Salomon, Deputy Director of the Support Instruments Department in the Ministry of the Economy and Jacek Jędruszak, Head of the Department of Promotion and Bilateral Cooperation in the Ministry of the Economy. A speech

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10,000 for Tools Factory Sp. j. Agnieszka Popławska, Robert Popławski from Stafanówka in Mazovia • Award of the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development in the agri-food sector was received by Beekeeping Farm Sądecki Bartnik A. i J. Kasztelewicz from Stróża near Grzybów in Małpolska

THE ASSOCIATION OF POLISH EXPORTERS AWARDED THE HONORARY MEDALS FOR “SERVICES TO EXPORTS” TO: • His Eminence Cardinal Kazimierz Nycz, Metropolitan of Warsaw • Jan Krzysztof Ardanowski, Member of Parliament • Jacek Piechota, former Minister of the Economy • Piotr Wozniak, former Minister of the Economy • Andrzej Kaczmarek, former Deputy Minister of the Economy • Andrzej Stefański, First Councillor - Head of the Trade and Investment Promotion Section in the Polish Embassy in Astana • Józef Siwiec, President of the Board of Zakłady Magnezytowe Ropczyce

followed by Stefan Tkaczyk, President of the Central Council of the Association of Polish Exporters, who discussed the use of EU funds in 2014-2020 from the point of view of exports development.

Participants of the 14th Congress of Polish Exporters highlighted the need for further improvements to systemic solutions aimed at innovation-oriented economic development and optimal growth of exports. The strategy of international expansion of Polish enterprises, was also discussed with a special consideration of effective promotion, new foreign outlets and prospects for them being entered

by Polish exporters. The need was stressed for more open relationship with the domestic and foreign media, as well as with the Polish press • abroad.

AWARDS PRESENTED DURING THE 14TH CONGRESS OF POLISH EXPORTERS: • 1st Award of the Minister of the Economy in the form of the Grand Prix statuette and the prize money of PLN 20,000 for Milk Suppliers Cooperative from Wieluń in the Łódź Region • 2nd Award of the Minister of the Economy in the form of the Grand Prix statuette and the prize money of PLN 15,000 for Mechanics and Forgery Plant Wostal Sp. z o.o. from Wolbrom in Małopolska • 3rd Award of the Minister of the Economy in the form of the Grand Prix statuette and the prize money of PLN

CUPS AND CONGRATULATORY LETTERS “OUTSTANDING EXPORTER OF THE YEAR 2015” WERE AWARDED TO: • Mokate Sp. z o.o.

• Creamery Cooperative Lazur

THE ASSOCIATION OF POLISH EXPORTERS AWARDED THE MEDALS “OUTSTANDING EXPORTER OF THE YEAR 2015 ” TO: In the mechanical industry: PPUH Horus Energia Sp. z o.o. from Sulejówek near Warsaw In the automotive industry: Grupa Alumetal from Kęty in Silesia In the agri-food industry: SuperDrob Meat and Poultry Plant from Karczew in Mazovia

CONGRATULATORY LETTERS AND THE MEDALS “ECONOMIC JOURNALIST OF THE YEAR 2015” WERE AWARDED TO: 1. Mikołaj Oniszczuk, Dean of the Corps of Promoters of Polish Exports 2. Krystyna Woźniak-Trzosek, Editor-in-Chief of “Polish Market” 3. Wojciech Nalazek, Director of Agricultural Section of TVP 1 4. Tadeusz Kucharuk, President of the Podlasie Consulting Agency 5. Henryk Borko, Rector of the Gliwice School of Entrepreneurship

Economy

HORUS-ENERGIA A CONSISTENT DEVELOPMENT

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orus-Energia has operated since 1984 and is now one of the largest and most reputable companies on the Polish power generation market. It offers comprehensive services covering generation units, starting from the selection phase, through the execution of necessary designs and approvals, delivery, installation, start-up, to warranty and after-warranty service. Horus-Energia uses great care to ensure top quality of its products, which is confirmed by an ISO 9001:2008 certificate of conformity. Its devices can work on a 24/7 basis, as an emergency, prime or continuous power or combined heat and power source, so the customers can have electricity and heat at any level, in any place, at any time.

In an interview with “Polish Market” in October 2013, Sylwester Jędra, Vice-President and Technical Director of Horus-Energia, said: “We seek expansion into the global market. Given the energy structure and market size of particular countries, as well as their natural resources, we target African and Asian countries. In Europe, there are very well-developed power industry systems, so the market is rather closed. In Poland, electricity is, somewhat paradoxically, cheaper than in Africa. In Asia, apart from electricity, there is also demand for heat, and thus for cogeneration units with an overall efficiency as high as 90%. In African countries, the so-called tri-generation systems are used that produce, besides electricity, cool air. In African climate, it is the optimal solution.” This was an announcement of important export decisions that were to be made in the following years.

On 4 March 2014, Horus-Energia signed with the Polish Agency for Enterprise Development (PARP) an agreement on co-financing the implementation of the Export Development Plan, Measure 6.1 Passport to Export, Priority axis

Jan Koblak, President of the Horus-Energia 6: Polish Economy on the International Market, Operational Programme Innovative Economy 2007-2013.

As part of the project, Horus-Energia participated in Power Nigeria Exhibition & Conference on 28-30 October in Lagos, Nigeria. The event was attended by dozens of renewable energy and nuclear energy suppliers from all over the world. The fair attracted widespread interest from Nigerian entrepreneurs. It should be noted that Nigeria has been recognised as one of the best investment locations in the world. The reason is the increasing demand for electric power, and thus the dynamic development of the energy sector.

Participation in Nigeria Power in 2014 allowed HorusEnergia to present its products and business.

The activities mentioned by Sylwester Jędra have been recognised during the 14th Congress of the Association of Polish Exporters on 19 November 2015. Horus-Energia received a medal of the Association of Polish Exporters “Outstanding Exporter of the Year 2015” in the electrical engineering industry.

The products of Horus-Energia are widely used by companies in Poland and abroad. There are already more than 1,800 installed generation units on the Polish market. Its users are, among others: Orlen, Motorola, Dell, Elektroskandia, Pol-Aqua, Budimex, Gaz System, Orange, Netia, the public administration, the army, police and border guards. As regards exports – something Horus-Energia has been rewarded for this year – more than 160 generation units are in service abroad, including in Britain, Estonia, Russia, Latvia, Ukraine, Mongolia, Mali and Nigeria, Chile and Australia.

The example of Horus Energy shows that a good product, combined with a well thought-out and consistently implemented development strategy, is a recipe for longterm success.

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Economy

SAVE FOR THE FUTURE, GET A CHRISTMAS GIFT NOW Ewa Małyszko, President of PKO BP BANKOWY PTE

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onsidering that long-term saving is not very popular among Poles, it is worth looking at possible ad hoc gains of postponing consumption over time. As the income tax accounting period is drawing to a close, you cannot forget about reliefs associated with savings accumulated in the third pillar of the pension system. More specifically, about the annual allowance to which the holders of the Individual Retirement Security Account (IKZE) are entitled.

Individual retirement accounts, available on the Polish market of the so-called pension products for over ten years now, offer a range of incentives for savers, with long-term investment being offered in the third pillar. In addition to the rate of return on investment, their holders enjoy full flexibility in making payments as well as the possibility to transfer funds from IKE, IKZE and PPE. The Individual Retirement Security Account (IKZE), a junior version of the Individual Retirement Account (IKE), launched in 2012 with a view to providing savers with tax benefits, enables taxpayers to deduct from the base the amount transferred to IKZE throughout the year. It is therefore important to declare such payments in the annual PIT return. Above all, however, these amounts are exempt from capital gains tax, which stands in Poland at 19%.

IKE VERSUS IKZE Tax relief afforded by IKE and IKZE differ in terms of timing. IKZE allows relief in the form of deduction of the amount of savings from the income (i.e. the tax base) in each fiscal year, whereas IKE funds are eligible for tax exemption only at the time of them being paid out, upon taxpayers reaching the age of 60, or 55 in the case of early retirement.

The major difference between IKE and IKZE is that the funds set aside in IKZE, at the time of withdrawal, will be added to income and will be subject to taxation. In accordance with the procedure in force, a flatrate income tax of 10% is charged on IKZE savings once withdrawn. Those entitled to

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withdrawal are savers over the age of 65, on condition of them having made payments for a minimum of five freely-selectable calendar years, or their legal heirs. If there is a need to pay out the money from IKZE before maturity, it is possible to make a return order of the total amount deposited, in which case the amount equivalent to return should be added to income and settled in the PIT tax return for the year in which the return was made; it will then be taxed in accordance with the applicable tax scale.

Both IKE and IKZE can be credited with any amounts not exceeding the limits set for a given year. In 2015, the limit of annual contributions for IKZE and IKE are PLN 4,750.80 and PLN 11, 877 respectively. Tax reliefs can be taken advantage of on condition of payments should be made for at least 5 calendar years, and in the case of IKE, more than half of the payments should be made no later than 5 years prior to filing a pension benefit application.

BONUS FOR EXPENSES Tax reliefs associated with IKZE, unmatched in comparison with the ordinary bank

deposits, savings accounts, or government bonds motivate people to start saving and help them realise that a relatively small effort can get you an attractive cash injection.

You can take this money as a bonus for saving and spend it, or pay it back into your account and continue saving.

In clearing the income tax, you have to remember to include your retirement savings in IKZE in the PIT return.

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Basically, in the case of IKZE, the only limitation is the cap on the total yearly contribution. The maximum amount of tax relief for 2015 for individual tax brackets is as follows: - for the tax rate of 18% - PLN 855.14 - for the tax rate of 32% - PLN 1,520.26 - for the flat-rate of 19% - PLN 902.65 Looking at the recent studies published by the Social Insurance Institution (ZUS), which have a stimulating impact on the social debate on the future of pensions, it is certain that a pension of about one-third of the current payout will not allow pensioners to live in dignity. In the case of IKE, the exemption from the capital gains tax is a good idea the state should further exploit, offering more incentives associated with longterm saving in the third pillar.

Economy

RESPONSIBLE BUSINESS AWARDS HAVE BEEN PRESENTED

Photo: Executive Club

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arsaw’s Sheraton Hotel was a venue for the Responsible Business Awards Gala hosted by the Executive Club on 20 November. Among those awarded were companies, nonprofits and philanthropists who have distinguished themselves by outstanding social and charity achievements.

The guests were welcomed by President of the Executive Club Beata Radomska and Chairman of the Club’s Council Marek Michałowski.

They recalled the difficult beginnings of the organisation, which has become a prestigious platform for top managers over the last 10 years.

Wishing the participants a pleasant evening, Beata Radomska expressed the hope that the first edition of the Responsible Business Awards Gala would usher in a long tradition of promotion of the idea of responsible business.

The Gala was opened with a letter from the President of the Republic of Poland. Andrzej Duda congratulated its originators and the winners of the Responsible Business Awards, and expressed the hope that the initiative of the Executive Club would continue to serve further development of Poland and that the discussion accompanying this solemn meeting would be an inspiration for others. The inaugural speech was delivered by Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Science and Higher Education, Jarosław Gowin, who stressed the importance of the event and the need for cooperation between business and science and charitable institutions.

Marek Krupiński, Director General of the Polish National Committee for UNICEF,

outlined the rules and advantages of cooperation of large companies with UNICEF. Dorota Hryniewiecka-Firlej, President of Pfizer Polska, told a short story about the love of reciprocity (“Do ut des”), recalling the earliest experiences that inspired her to work for the benefit of others. These presentations were followed by a debate on charity in business chaired by Prof. Boleslaw Rok from the Department of Business Ethics of Koźminski University. The speakers were: Artur Czepczyński, Owner and Chairman of the Board at ABC - Czepczyński Sp. z o.o., Dr Dorota Hryniewiecka-Firlej, MD, President of Pfizer Polska Sp. z o.o., Andrzej Klesyk, President of PZU SA, and Wojciech Szpil, President of Totalizator Sportowy Sp. z o.o.

A key point of the Gala was the awards ceremony. The Jury awarded this year as many as 17 statuettes and 5 special awards. The winners in the category of “Outstanding CSR Strategy” were the Raben Group, PZU SA and Unibep SA, and special mentions went to Lyreco Polska SA and Promedica Care. Awards for “Outstanding CSR Project” were received by Konsalnet Holding SA, Philips Lighting Poland and Robert Bosch. Statuettes “Outstanding Corporate Philanthropist” were awarded to Asseco Poland SA, Microsoft and Totalizator Sportowy.

The title of “Outstanding Individual Philanthropist” was conferred on Artur Czepczyński, Owner, President of ABC – Czepczyński, and Katarzyna Rudnicka, President of Vivenge.

Siemacha Association, founded by Father Andrzej Augustyński, was recognised as “Outstanding Non-Profit Organisation”, while Ewa Błaszczyk’s Akogo? Foundation and SOS Wioski

Dziecięce Association were honoured with special mentions in this category.

In addition, the Executive Club’s Management Board decided to award special prizes to its members who have distinguished themselves by determination in pursuit of the vision of the company’s development and contributed to making Poland’s economy stronger. The winners of the “Special Award for Outstanding Leader” were: Dorota Hryniewiecka-Firlej, President of Pfizer Poland, Jacek Krawiec, President of PKN Orlen and Dirk Elvermann, President of BASF in 2012-2015, and the “Special Award for Business Visionary” was handed in to Adam Krzanowski, President of Grupa Nowy Styl, and Krzysztof Pawiński, President of Maspex.

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The Gala was hosted by Odeta Moro, a radio and TV anchor, and Stanislaw Sygitowicz, a film actor.

Social Partners: Siemacha Association, SOS Wioski Dziecięce Association, Wiosna Association and Responsible Business Forum.

Strategic Partners: Pfizer Polska Sp. z o.o. i and Totalizator Sportowy Sp. z o.o.

Gala Partners: ABC - Czepczyński Sp. z o.o. Sp.k., Konsalnet Holding, PayU S.A., Promedica Care Sp. z o.o., PIKA Sp. z o.o., PwC, Ruch S.A., Vivenge Sp. z o.o.

Main Networking Partner: SONRISO Travel Networking Partners: JA Baczewski, Grimbergen, Pieroth Polska Media Partners: Radio Kolor, Dziennik Gazeta Prawna, Brief, Manager, Polish Market, Poland Today, Stosunki Międzynarodowe, Madame, Imperium Kobiet, Law Business Quality, Rynek Inwestycji, newsrm.tv, capital24.tv, progressforpoland.com

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Economy

MOLTON

FROM POLAND

Magdalena Majchrzak-Puczyńska, Managing Director of Molton, talks to “Polish Market”.

Molton is a Polish manufacturer of elegant women’s clothing. Established in 1989, it offers top-quality clothes. From your experience, how has the style of Polish women evolved over these years?

Indeed, the quality of our clothes and accessories is a priority for us.

The company was set up in the late 1980s. Although the range of products was not at the time as wide as today, the Molton brand has always been characterised by two basic features: a simple, classic style and a very high quality of fabrics and workmanship. These features are still valid today. The first Molton shop was opened in 1999.

It appears from our observations that Poles appreciated, and still do, the classic elegance, which relies on simple, almost minimalist styles, and neutral colours. This is always fashionable and this is what the Molton brand has a name for. We do not follow trends blindly. Certainly, you can find a lot of modern touches in our collection, but the backbone of it is comfortable classics that our customers simply love.

As Poland was changing over years, women have become more open to fashion novelties, but also more aware of their expectations. So we listen to them, and we are looking for new solutions and inspirations to continue to create collections that will satisfy the most demanding customers.

PM

What distinguishes Molton from other brands?

Molton is synonymous with the modern and simple elegance, the comfort of precious fabrics, and the precision of cut. The collection is directed to customers who value high quality and classic style. Each design is carefully elaborated and finished up with great attention to detail and wearing comfort; 95% of our clothes are sewn in Poland. It is a kind of tradition of our brand that has been on the market for nearly 30 years now. In conclusion, you can say that Molton’s style is defined by: classicism, high quality, minimalism, modern look and femininity.

PM

Molton has 34 shops in Poland. Are you planning to open more?

Currently, we have 34 shops and an online shop. In 2015, a total of eight new shops were opened, and a similar expansion is planned next PM

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year. Molton is a brand addressed to the demanding and wealthy customer, a fact that should be taken into account when determining new locations. Overall, I think the market is able to accommodate twice our current number of shops.

Speaking of your plans for next year, what about foreign expansion?

Is “conquering the world” somewhere on your mind?

Of course, we are eager to pursue development as far as possible. Foreign markets are seriously considered. In the near future, we are planning to open a shop in Lausanne. This is something we are only starting with, so it is too early for specific statements. But yes, it is true that we are thinking about foreign expansion.

PM

E-commerce, including mobile commerce, is growing in importance. Are you not afraid that it will pose a serious threat to brick and mortar shops?

Indeed, we do observe a growing interest in online shopping. It is very convenient, especially for those who are busy doing professional things and do not have much free time, like most of our customers. We do not regard these trends as something negative. On the contrary, we are upgrading our online shop to meet the ever changing needs of our customers. Our new website www.molton.pl has had its premiere recently. Still, I do not think that online sales could be a threat to brick and mortar in the nearest future. Customers take pleasure in “traditional” shopping, allowing them to visit shops and get professional advice from shop assistants.

PM

What will be the fashion trends in 2016?

Coco Chanel once said that “fashion fades, only style remains the same”. We have a similar understanding of fashion at Molton. Irrespective of trends that change, we are faithful to what has been our strategic choice – timeless elegance. We hope that the year 2016 will prove • fruitful for our collection.

PM

www.molton.pl

PEARLS OF THE POLISH ECONOMY

MAGNIFIQUE FESTIVE SEASON AT SOFITEL WARSAW VICTORIA Discover the art of celebrating Christmas and enjoy a sparkling New Year’s Eve Cabaret Revue at Sofitel Warsaw Victoria.

CHRISTMAS DINNER AT LE VICTORIA BRASSERIE MODERNE

CHRISTMAS BRUNCH AT KITCHEN GALLERY

Enjoy an exquisite 5-course family Christmas dinner created by our chef Maciej Majewski to reflect the beauty of Polish Christmas culinary culture and the unique “Art de Noël” of French tradition.

Gourmand Christmas culinary experience for the whole family. Enjoy a unique family Christmas gathering at Sofitel Warsaw Victoria. We offer a 50% discount for kids from 6 to 12 years old. Younger children can enjoy the brunch for free.

Date: December 24th-26th Price: PLN 150 per person

Date: December 25th Price: PLN 175 per person

Reservations: Tel.: 22 657 83 82 | Email: brasserie.moderne@sofitel.com

Reservations: Tel.: 22 657 82 62 | Email: kitchen.gallery@sofitel.com

2016

NEW YEAR’S EVE WITH THEATRE SABAT AT SOFITEL WARSAW VICTORIA Welcome the New Year in a cabaret style. Enjoy an excellent 5-course gala dinner and a delightful after midnight buffet complemented by a spectacular revue show prepared by Małgorzata Potocka and the Sabat Theatre.

Date: December 31st Price: PLN 690 per person (package of beverages included) Reservations: Tel.: 22 657 82 89 | Email: H3378-CR@sofitel.com

SOFITEL WARSAW VICTORIA KRÓLEWSKA 11, 00-065 WARSAW, POLAND TEL.:+48 22 6578011 - E-MAIL: H3378@SOFITEL.COM

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Cultural Monitor

“A MUSIC THAT HAS ITS BEARING” IS THE THEME OF DECEMBER’S CULTURAL MONITOR. ALBUMS RECOMMENDED BY MACIEJ PROLIŃSKI

Benjamin Britten – “The Turn of the Screw Op. 54” - concert version - DUX - 2CD

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ritten’s seventh opera, commissioned for the Venice Biennale in 1954 (with a libretto by Myfanwa Piper, based on a novel by Henry James), was played in Poland only once - in 1977 as the Scottish Opera made its guest appearances. In 2015, “The Turn Of The Screw” made its comeback to Poland resounding (in concert version) during the Easter Festival of Ludwig van Beethoven as part of the “Unknown Operas” series, curated by Piotr Kamiński. The album, released by the publishing house DUX, in cooperation with the National Audiovisual Institute and the United States Embassy in Poland, is premiered in Poland.

“In terms of dramaturgical precision, it is a masterpiece. The composer sips a discreet charm of the evil, which is here attractive and terrifying at the same time,” says conductor Łukasz Borowicz. Outstanding young singers from the United States and the United Kingdom were invited to join the project under his baton: tenor Eric Barry (Peter Quint), soprano Emily Workman (Governess), soprano Kathleen Reveille (Miss Jessel), Diana Montague (Mrs. Grose), soprano Rosie Lomas (Flora) and treble Dominic Lynch (Miles).

Instrumental parts were performed by the great Polish musicians who are soloists in major symphony orchestras. “Britten’s music is not easy, you need to stand on your toes to reach its beauty,” says Piotr Kamiński. Full agreement. The whole of this music stems from and returns to lyrics, and Britten’s vocal and instrumental pieces are the essence of his work. And Britten himself is really a model example of the British music in how it has always had its own individual dimension, separate tone and individual chronology. While drawing upon the continental tradition, it has always underlined its particularity, a “British” quality and great sophistication.

“Amy” - Universal Music - CD

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he original soundtrack for “Amy”, an excellent documentary directed by Asif Kapadia, is already available in Poland. The film has won cinema audiences not only in Poland, but across the world, being one of the most watched music documentaries in film history. Amy Winehouse, who died at the age of 27, was the brightest artistic revelation of the past decade. Often compared to Billie Holiday, the controversial Briton has changed the face of modern pop music. Her extremely personal lyrics and hits such as “Rehab” and “Back to Black”, inspired by the music of the 1960s, revived the retro fashion and instantly became classics of the genre. In addition to songs by Amy herself (often in concert versions, or interesting, previously unknown, demos), the album contains the soundtrack for a film by Antonio Pinto, a Brazilian composer, author of soundtracks for such films as “Central Station” by Walter Salles, “City of God” by Fernando Meirelles, or “Lord of War” and “Intruder” by Andrew Niccol. You listen to this album exactly the way you watch this truly moving document - to the very end, though you know the ending ...

“Fly, My Voice” - Zawartko/Piasecki - Captain Earth - CD

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debut album of singer Magdalena Zawartko and bassist Grzegorz Piasecki. What prompted these young, but already acclaimed, Wrocław’s artists to start work on this album was the fact that the project was joined by “Laboratory of Music - We Are From Here” under the musical direction of Włodek Pawlik and Adam Klocek at the Festival FAMA 2012. They asked several artists of their choice to prepare arrangements for classic literature pieces or Polish folk melodies. Magdalena Zawartko prepared with her quintet the song “Fly, My voice, Over The Dew” on the basis on the composition by Karol Szymanowski. They also arranged songs by Grieg and Rakhmaninov. The idea of combining folk melodies and their classical themes with jazz, bonded with ethnic accents, had been maturing in them until the creation of this album. And the latter is a wonderful and simply beautiful example of “Polish world music” Anno Domini 2015. Well, perhaps more that from philharmonics than from a smoky jazz club. The album’s stylistic differentiation and its ever-changing moods mean that you have to listen to it intently to enjoy the music. Captivating is also elegance, total agreement, concertation and creativity of all the musicians, among whom are also Piotr Wojtasik (trumpet), Tomasz Wendt (saxophones), Artur Tuźnik (piano) and José Torres (percussion instruments).

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Cultural Monitor – December 2015

Cultural Monitor

“Andrzej Jagodziński - In Tribute To Freedom” - Polish Radio - CD

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ndrzej Jagodziński is one of the most outstanding Polish jazz pianists, composers and arrangers. In 1993, together with drummer Czesław Bartkowski and bassist Adam Cegielski, he formed the band Andrzej Jagodziński Trio. They play concerts, record discs and excite audiences till now. But “In Tribute To Freedom” is a completely new meeting of the trio’s leader with the history of Polish song since the Second World War till the 1990s (e.g. “Rain, autumn rain” Marian Matuszkiewicz, “Song About My Warsaw”

by Albert Harris, “Red Poppies on Monte Cassino” by Longin Alfred Schutz, “Walls” by Jacek Kaczmarski, “Do Not Ask About Poland” Grzegorz Ciechowski). Jagodziński masterfully blends here the solemn theme of the songs with jazz interpretation. The original arrangements of individual songs, known to most listeners, take on completely new sounds, without losing any of their lyrical seriousness. The album features guest singers: Anna Stankiewicz and Agnieszka Wilczyńska, and guest players: guitarist Janusz Strobel and trumpeter Robert Majewski. Their meeting is a brilliant one. First of all, because (although this time in jazz terms) it is still a poetry and a music from here, from the only such place on Earth.

“Songs From Yesterday” - Mieczysław Szcześniak/Krzysztof Herdzin - Sony Music - CD

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ieczysław Szcześniak, one of the most popular Polish vocalists, most often associated with such genres as soul, funk and gospel, and Krzysztof Herdzin, a pianist, composer and arranger, one of the busiest Polish musicians and one of the few artists successfully combining classical music and jazz, film music and pop, have teamed up to create a unique album with hits from the “Great American Songbook” canon.

Szcześniak sings very stylishly and poetically. Herdzin is an author of unpretentious, jazzy arrangements and a consummate accompanist. The musicians have put the bar high when deciding to record songs from the repertoire of the greatest singers - John Lennon, Eric Clapton and Stevie Wonder. The album contains both flagship hits (“Yesterday” or “Tears In Heaven”) and less known songs that it makes you pleasure to discover. The arrangements of the Szcześniak-Herdzin duo often differ from the originals, but always treat popular music with due respect. On the one hand, the album is a tribute to world-class performers, on the other hand – a meeting of two outstanding Polish artists to whom music gives great joy. This joy rubs off!

“Polish Nostalgia. Vol. 9 “- Polish Radio - CD

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t is already the ninth part of the jubilee record collection released on the occasion of the 90th anniversary of Polish Radio. The series appeals to the sentiment of the now adult audience, an audience that appreciates something more than just the memory of momentary popularity of old Polish songs. “It is not our intention to repeat ever again the list of the greatest hits. True, there are big hits too, but not because they were once great, but because they stood the test of time, they did not wear out, and listening to them, recalling them is a form of aesthetic pleasure,” stress the authors of this compilation. This time, we get simply smart lyrics. Each of the songs brings timeless truths most of us meet with daily. We do not usually take time to ponder on the relevance of the observations made by their authors 40 or 30 years ago. Is has been two generations, a long time ... The world has changed ... Only good lyrics and good music invariably moves and delights us. The collection includes, “Sleepless By Two” by Andrzej Zaucha, “Samba Before Parting” by Hanna Banaszak, “The Days We Do Not Know Yet” by Marek Grechuta, “We Still Play Green” by Magda Umer, or “As If Nothing Happened” by Voo Voo. It is worth knowing and returning to these recordings.

“Sea You Later” - The Dumplings - Warner - CD

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he second album of this young Polish duo relies on electronics in the sense of new sounds, without forgetting about catchy songs, the hallmark of the work of Justyna Święs and Kuba Karaś. Entirely composed, written and produced by the duo, it is a great example of the finest pop: rooted in the classics of the genre from the 1980s, while boldly flirting with modern electronics at the same time. The compositions and their modern club sounds will certainly appeal to the tastes of those who want to have intelligent fun listening to music. The second asset of thi album is definitely emotional lyrics, telling about teenage mental dilemmas in the modern world. The third one is indisputably 17-year-old Justyna Święs who, as far as I know, is not a star of any talent show, and yet she has already made herself a name as a recognisable vocalist, including outside The Dumplings, e.g. with Fisz and Emade, or in “Placówka ‘44” by Voo Voo, where she movingly, authentically and convincingly sang the Warsaw Uprising poetry.

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Culture

OPERA ON TV AND COMPUTER SCREENS

The streaming platform TWON Platform is in place – Poland’s first service for streaming opera and ballet performances over the Internet. On 19 November, Moniuszko’s “The Haunted Manor”, considered one of the most important Polish operas, was available for watching on private television and computer screens in Poland and everywhere in the world through the free streaming service TWON Platform (vod.teatrwielki.pl).

Maciej Proliński

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9 November was a symbolic day for the Teatr Wielki - Polish National Opera.

On this very day in 1825 the cornerstone for the theatre building was laid.

Destroyed during World War II, it was rebuilt and reopened on 19 November 1965.

Exactly half a century later, on 19 November 2015, the theatre launched the TWON Platform, Poland’s first service for streaming opera and ballet performances over the Internet.

The platform premiered with Stanisław Moniuszko’s “The Haunted Manor”, considered one of the most important Polish operas.

The production is the work of David Pountney, a British visionary and internationally-acclaimed opera director, who tackles the canonical “Polish national opera” from the standpoint of an independent observer, free of the stale perceptions and stereotypes that the work has attracted over the years.

The Polish opera gem, an elaborate musical comedy written with a dramatic flair and hilarious plot, based on double bachelor’s vows, has for years stirred excitement and emotion.

The performance of “This Old Clock”, the most famous Polish opera aria, invariably meets with thunderous applause. The piece, written a year after the lost January Uprising, it is also a great poetic synthesis of traditional Polish culture - traditions, rituals, costumes and dances.

“I showed David ‘The Haunted Manor’ and, when he read the libretto, he asked me: ‘OK, but what is it about?’ A man coming from a different cultural background simply did not understand what had made this work so valuable at the time it was written - in 1861-1864, that is under the tsarist censorship. I explained to him that the most important here is what is unwritten: the power of symbolism that rises above the limitations imposed by censorship. So it is with all the great works of Polish romantic literature. David realised that the

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plot is set in the final years of Poland’s First Republic. So we have a free Poland, but we can also feel its nearing twilight... He found a parallel with another moment of Polish freedom, that is 1920s and 1930s. Naturally, this will cause a lot of discussion. But I think the theatre’s missions is to open debates around things that are subject to all sorts of interpretations. In this case it is also about checking the chance of ‘The Haunted Manor’ for an international career,” says Waldemar Dąbrowski, Director General of Teatr Wielki - Polish National Opera. Its Orchestra and Choir were led for the first time by the new music director - Andriy Yurkevich. The cast included: Edyta Piasecka, Tadeusz Szlenkier, Rafał Siwek and Adam Kruszewski.

For the first time in the opera house’s history, not only the ticket holders were treated to the special, jubilee production. Launching the TWON Platform, Teatr Wielki - Polish National Opera joined a select group of international opera houses which have employed new technologies and the Internet to reach out to new audiences. To facilitate the streaming service a new recording system has been set up at the opera house, including a 4K vision control room and a 5.1 acoustic control room, a live room, and an equipment room. The TWON Platform’s team will have at their disposal ten 4K HD video cameras, which may be remotely controlled, which includes refocusing and colour grading. We are looking forward to further broadcasts!

•

Culture

BEAUTY

of a tale,

BEAUTY

of an image

A series of 12 large-size ink, gouache and watercolour compositions by Sławomir Chrystow, commissioned by Marek Potocki and interpreting “The Saragossa Manuscript” (“Manuscrit trouvé à Saragosse”), a novel by Count Jan Potocki (1761-1815), a Polish author writing in French, is on display at the Royal Library of the Royal Castle in Warsaw until 31 January 2016.

Maciej Proliński

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015 was declared by UNESCO the Year of Jan Potocki - a descendant of the famous aristocratic family, writer, playwright, politician, historian, traveller and researcher of antiquity and folk customs. He authored, among others, historical texts, foreign travel stories, philosophical treatises and plays. One of his most famous works is “Manuscrit trouvé à Saragosse.” The book chronicles the adventures of Alphonse van Worden who, made captain of the Walloon Guard by King Philip V, sets off to Spain in 1739. While hiking through the Sierra Morena Mountains, he encounters strange newcomers and hears their amazing stories.

“The Saragossa Manuscript” was first published in French in 1813 and was long unknown in Poland. It was translated into Polish only 34 years later. In 1965, the novel was made into a film of the same title by Wojciech Jerzy Has (1925-2000), which is by far the most unusual and amazing film in the history of Polish cinematography, surrounded in Poland and abroad by a kind of a cult. Has’s adaptation of “The Saragossa Manuscript” offers a wonderful consolation, showing the

power and grace of a tale (understood here as a process of making - process of hearing).

The power of a tale is even capable of postponing (overcoming) death... The great talent of Has - the greatest poet of Polish cinema, an extraordinary master of mood, stories about transience and death - guarantees that this film will always be something more than just “a costume comedy”, “swashbuckler”or “fantasy ghost story”, despite that among all his 14 films it is the only cheerful one, not to say a comedy.

“The wonderfulness lies in that its attractive form conveys the important content. It is simply a school of life, a cross-section of society – valid both in the 18th century and today.

The hero has to start thinking and what is at stake is the way he will think. There are two interpretations: the mystical, magical philosophy of a cabbalist clashes with the humanist rationalism of a mathematician. Not only van Worden needs to make a choice, the viewer does too,” explained Has. One of the youngest artistic interpretations of “The Saragossa Manuscript” is a series of 12 large-size compositions by Sławomir Chrystow, a Polish-Bulgarian of oriental

background. He deals with drawing, painting and printmaking. Fascinated by the art of Moghul India, ancient Persia and the Italian Quattrocento, he creates a unique artistic language, combining the symbolism and aesthetics of different cultures and eras. Alongside traditional means of expression, he also uses the oriental art of Ebru (water painting) and calligraphy. Open to the world of fairy tales and myths, he creates images where the past mingles with the present and reality with fiction. Thus - like Potocki and Has - he refers to archetypes and symbols deeply rooted in our imagination.

In addition to Chrystow’s illustrations, the Royal Library of the Royal Castle in Warsaw also displays the Potocki family portraits (including excellent paintings by Anton Graff and Johann Baptist Lampi), several items belonging to the author of “ The Saragossa Manuscript”, as well as notebooks with the manuscript of the novel. The exhibited works and memorabilia come from the collection of Marek Potocki, the Łańcut Castle Museum, the Teresa Sahakian Foundation and the Royal Castle Museum in Warsaw.

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Culture

I THINK THAT POLES ARE HAPPY WITH US...

The Polish concert agency market is steadily growing, but it is still far from the European average. Let’s first talk about how Pawlik Relations is inspiring and enriching the music market.

We organise concerts, produce and release albums. In these fields, we want to be a communication and cooperation platform for the Polish and foreign music industry. We want to inspire the Polish music market. I think we are successful. Many people from Poland and abroad are delighted with the play on words in our name ... I started out as manager in 2006. I am a pianist by education, so I had to make myself familiar with the rules of business, accounting. I had to learn it quickly and I did. The driving force behind the project is my husband - Włodek Pawlik, a prominent jazzman, winner of the prestigious Grammy Award in the category of “Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album” for the album “Night in Calisia” recorded with trumpeter Randy Brecker. Włodek is one of the few Polish artists successfully combining jazz, symphonic music and film music. He has recorded 30 albums. It is a huge and stylistically diverse PM

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Photo: Marek Bałata

Jolanta Pawlik, pianist, manager and producer, co-owner of Pawlik Relations Concert Agency, talks to Maciej Proliński. work. We live in “real time”, which means at a fast pace to fulfill my husband’s commitments in terms of concerts and composing – they are so many, but we do not complain.

We are happy and I think that Poles are happy with us, too. One day, time will certainly come to take a relaxed look at it, to summarise what Włodek created. We will get back to it. I am convinced that it is also one of the tasks of Pawlik Relations.

Every society is reportedly being conducted by that 1% of those whom God favours. These people should be looked for and brought together. A community like this is a source of meaningful creations.

Are Polish music universities such a source today? You lecture at the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw. Do you think that this university is a bridge between education and working life, for example for highly talented young singers?

I believe that it is much more than 1% ...

I am a graduate of the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in the piano class and the chamber music class. And for 20 years, PM

I have been a lecturer at the vocal department.

I work in an excellent singing class of Prof. W. Zalewski, who has many talented students.

I would say that we are a team of people supporting each other. Young people definitely need support, also (or perhaps especially) as they leave the university. It is such a difficult moment, when they have to start to think for themselves and look for jobs, which is not easy. The profession of a singer - with schedules, hearings and competitions - is always extremely stressful. Nor is it easy to pick out a talent. Voice capabilities, but also personality, faith, hard work, and finally the ability of making contacts - these are the factors that determine whether one will be successful or not ... For me, such an extraordinary meeting, while I was still a student, was a meeting with mezzo-soprano Elwira Janasik, now a soloist of the Baltic Opera and the Grand Theatre in Łódź. I knew she was the person I was waiting for. I mean her beautiful voice, stage charisma, emotionality. She absorbed all my remarks on performance and repertoire while we worked on the album containing often unknown and beautiful songs

Culture of Moniuszko, published in 2014 by Pawlik Relations.

This was your and Elwira’s debut album, so well remembered by music lovers. Since then, as a pianist, but also as a producer, you have co-recorded two more Schubertdedicated albums, with an equally worthy programme: “Die schöne Müllerin” and “Winterreise”, with tenor Karol Kozłowski.

I met him for the first time as he was only starting to learn singing. Several years later, I saw him in “Elektra” at the Grand Theatre in Warsaw. Then I happened to play a concert at the Chopin University of Music, and I could invite one artist to accompany me. And I invited him. We performed eleven songs from Schubert’s “Die schöne Müllerin” and then we simply knew that it must be continued somehow. And I rediscovered in myself a flair for music production (earlier I had produced my husband’s plates). The album was released in 2012 and gathered excellent reviews. We have worked a lot together ever since, not only on Schubert, but also Britten, or Beethoven.

Yet it was Schubert’s “Winterreise” that became, three years later, the reason why we met again for longer. Karol approached this extremely difficult task with sensitivity and understanding. It is also worth noting that PM

the booklet attached to the album contains translations of poems by Wilhelm Müller. I am always keen to make sure that people know “what it is about” because the music may disappoint them ... After all, the most dramatic songs telling about death in the “Winterreise” series are in a major key… a mystery, the essence of this great, nobly concise, unobviously captivating music.

Your plans as Pawlik Relations?

I am about to start further recordings of Moniuszko’s songs, this time bass tab. I already have a musical partner, a repertoire, lyrics translated, but I do not want to put a jinx on it by revealing too much. At the beginning of 2016, we are preparing a jazz surprise, namely a debut album of our son Łukasz Pawlik, a cellist, pianist and jazz composer. The album features, among others, Mike Stern and Michael “Patches” Stewart! I am also working with the Myślenicka Chamber Orchestra “Concertino” on a new project consisting of symphonic pieces by Włodek Pawlik.

I can feel that the combination of the names of my husband, conductor Michael Maciaszczyk and phenomenal energy of these young musicians (their idealism!) will soon bring about something unusual, also on the publishing • market!

PM

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“ MAKE THE NOW THE PRIMARY FOCUS OF YOUR LIFE.”

GODAI.PL

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Energy

WATCH OUT!

A TALENT

Photo: Agnieszka Charuba

ON THE HORIZON

I write, so I am not left with nothing...

In 2011, Oficyna Wydawnicza Rynek Polski Sp. z o.o. released the literary debut of Alicja Wolniewicz – “Psia Planeta” (Dog Planet). Alicja, then 12-year-old, recounted in her novel the adventures of a little girl on a planet inhabited by dogs.

The young author drew inspiration from the classics of Jan Brzechwa. In November 2015, during the 21st edition of the Theatre Festival organised by the Jan Kochanowski High School in Warsaw, Alicja (a second year student of that school) won the prize in the category of “The Best Theatre Screenplay” for the monodrama “Attic”. We follow Alicja’s blossoming career and we keep our fingers crossed. The imagination, common sense and hard work (of herself and her parents) should be seen as a promise that she may stir things up in Polish literature in the future...

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licja, now a teenager, has been writing since she was seven. “It is like it was always in me. I started with short stories. They were coming out somehow naturally... Then, I felt like writing longer forms. This was the case of “Dog Planet” for example. Now I am focused on theatre and drama. I attend the Theatre Centre “U Machulskich”, which continues the tradition of the legendary Theatre Centre at the Ochota Theatre, created by Jan and Halina Machulski, where actors such as Piotr Adamczyk, or Agnieszka Grochowska made their first steps as actors. The place is designed for artistically gifted teenagers aged between 13 and 18 who are at a point of shaping their personalities. We learn different aspects of acting - drama, dance and music. And we are working together on our own performances. It is very important for me and I really get a lot out of these classes. I want to work with an actor in the creation process to get a smack of a person’s skills to be able to use them on stage later,” she says.

The Jan Kochanowski High School Theatre Festival is one of the largest such events in Warsaw. The festival is organised by the students

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Maciej Proliński

of the Jan Kochanowski High School, and dramas making part of the contest are staged by young people from all over Warsaw. The festival is supported by headmasters and teachers of Warsaw high schools and drama teachers.

The event plays an important role in education and teaching, and nurtures interests and talents. In her award-winning monodrama “Attic”, Alicja poses a fundamental question about the human culture and the role of an artist in the modern world.

“This is a story about an artist finding his way around as human and as a social creature. The attic referred to in the play’s title is the highest place you can get, a place where you are a kind of “above society”, and there is no one else... The silent “Attic” is also a narrative about discovering art inside yourself. My friend Klaudia Bukato, who plays a role in the drama, gets herself dirty with paint bit by bit, daubs herself more and more the way that by the end of the monodrama she is wet painted to the last inch... ‘How white is your mind?’ – the audience ask at some point. So the play is about me, Klaudia and the people who see their future with art. Being artists, despite the probably inevitable solitude, is

something uniting. For me, the greatest thing about the art is that you can escape from the real world. I write, so I am not left with nothing.

Even if people do not read my stories, or plays, I can still continue to cultivate my skills. ‘Writing for the drawer’ is the worst option, though.

I draw a lot from people, process it by myself and I have my text uttered by an actor, and moreover, I can quite quickly see the reaction to that text. What a feeling! I also draw on the literature: Jean-Paul Sartre, Marek Hłasko, or Dorota Masłowska. They are definitely my favourite authors, whose prose is somehow forming me,” says Alicja. She does have an unquestionable ardour for writing, so I asked about her artistic plans. “I am eager to study screenwriting at the State Higher School of Film, Television and Theatre in Łódź. This is a legendary establishment, with comprehensive approach to education and excellent teachers, who influence your perception of artistic professions, but also the world as a whole. But there competition is fierce.

It is not easy to get there. We will see. I have to pass my high-school leaving exams first. And • it is coming soon!”

Culture

L.T - “Ulotne marzenie”

A BETTER WORLD OF LUBOMIR TOMASZEWSKI On 13 November, an international conference devoted to the life and work of Prof. Lubomir Tomaszewski, a legend of Polish industrial design, sculptor and painter known primarily in the US, was held in the Reduta Hall of the Teatr Wielki - Polish National Opera in Warsaw. The Polish audience becomes increasingly fascinated with his pictures painted with fire and smoke, and sculptures created in an endearing “duet with nature.”

Maciej Proliński

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I believe that the conference will give a new impetus to discussion about the art of Lubomir Tomaszewski and will encourage researchers, art historians, journalists and those involved in contemporary art to make themselves familiar with and further explore his extraordinary work, yet little known in Poland,” stressed Katarzyna Zalewska, president of the Art and Design LT Foundation, the conference organiser.

For the first time, Tomaszewski’s artistic path in an effort to create a unique painting technique using fire and smoke was shown.

The technique produces extreme lightness effects and shows both a destroying and terrifying power of fire. Among the speakers was Ewa Bobrowska, PhD, a graduate of art history at the Sorbonne living in Paris, curator of many exhibitions, including the last great hits - retrospectives by Olga Boznańska at the National Museums in Kraków and Warsaw. Discussing Tomaszewski’s selected pictures and biographical threads, she touched upon the issue of the Holocaust, which occupies a special place in the artist’s work and life. Ken Benson, who lectures at the School of Design in New York, focused on the essence of Tomaszewski’s art.

“I shall begin with design and art as these were the first products of mankind, like for example dishes designed to serve food, or paintings on the walls of caves. The ability of abstract

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thinking and creating is what distinguishes man from the animals and what constitutes our humanity. The first products of human hands, found in museums, are supposed to remind us of our origins. We can see in them a direct reference to the work of Lubomir Tomaszewski.

Another important point about his life I would like to mention is his home and Emotionalism.

Tomaszewski’s works are directed to everyone, as they deal with human feelings, human soul and various emotional states, and they bring above all joy. Tomaszewski interacts with the world, displaying fortitude and humanity.

I believe that this is precisely what drives him as an artist. Anyone who meets with his work receives a huge dose of optimism and belief that we are able to create a better world in which we can all live,” he said.

An exhibition of more than a dozen of Tomaszewski’s works was a real treat for the lovers of his talent. Sketches, sculptures and paintings were brought from the US especially for the conference. Participants could admire them over the space of 540 sqm in former museum halls of the Teatr Wielki. Among the exhibits was the sculpture “Flaying to Freedom”, which had been on show in the Palace of Nations in Geneva last year. There were also porcelain coffee sets “Ina” and “Dorota”, his most important design achievements.

Prof. Lubomir Tomaszewski, born in 1923, an alumnus of the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts, is an extraordinary artist, searching for his own artistic way. Ambitious, he aims at creating art nobody else has ever created. In 1966, he went to New York, a city that became his new home, where he could find his way to artistic freedom and fame. He has over 150 solo and collective exhibitions around the world to his credit.

His works are found in museums and galleries around the world, as well as in private collections (of, for example, Lawrence Rockefeller’s family and the former US President Jimmy Carter). In Poland, he is best known for his unique collection of porcelain sculptures and the coffee sets “Ina” and “Dorota”, which were created in the 1950s and 1960s in the Institute of Industrial Design in Warsaw. Prof. Tomaszewski graduated in sculpture, which remains the major form of his artistic expression. But the desire to seek new and powerful means of expression led him to a unique painting technique. Pictures painted with fire are part of an experimental realism, in which the artist is looking for new creative means of expression through formal experiments. In addition to coffee and tea sets, handmade porcelain figures, legendary paintings, as well as many new designs can be seen in the Porcelain Factory AS Ćmielów, a craft producer of porcelain with more than • a 200-year tradition.

We wish our Clients and business Partners a wonderful and cosy Christmas and a Prosperous and Healthy New Year.

Events

110 YEARS OF DOM TECHNIKA IN WARSAW

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ball was organised by the Federation of Engineering Associations NOT and Warszawski Dom Technika NOT Sp. z o.o. on 21 November 2015 to mark the 110th anniversary of the construction of Dom Technika (Technicians’ Association House). The building was erected in the time when Poland was under foreign occupation, on the initiative of the Warsaw Association of Technicians, created in 1898. Its Council decided at a general meeting on 3 August 1901 to build the premises of the Association, an institution centering the social life of its members while also fulfilling technical and scientific tasks. 120 thousand rubles were contributed by the Association’s members to buy a plot of 2,100 sqm in Warsaw at 3/5 Włodzimierska Street (since 1919 Tadeusza Czackiego Street). A design of Jan Fijałkowski won the competition and the construction got under way on 31 July 1903, benefiting from significant donations, both in materials and labour. The construction was completed on 25 November 1905. Dom Technika was put into use. Its cost, including interior arrangement and ornately decorated front elevation, was 215 thousand rubles. Details of the construction of Dom Technika and its rich history can be learnt from the past issues of “Przegląd Techniczny.”

As soon as in 1913, the Warsaw Association of Technicians announced a competition for the design of additional outbuildings, whose construction was completed in 1914.

As a result, a garden located at the rear of the building, 3 metres above the ground, was strongly reduced. The garden was connected by stairs and a terrace with the dining room on the first floor, and a bowling alley was underneath.

Dom Technika consists of the two main pavilions, i.e. the front one and the rear one. Inside these pavilions there are staircases with side galleries on the first and second floors.

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The building housed 7 apartments of various sizes for officials and servants, including a 3-room apartment with a kitchen for the restaurant tenant. The building had 4 floors. On the first floor, with the exception of the lobby and the main entrance on the side of what is now Tadeusza Czackiego Street, apartments were leased by, among others, a printing house and a bookshop. On the second floor there were the Association’s offices and library, and in the rear part – a restaurant. The third floor housed a conference hall in the front part, and a kitchen and club halls in the rear part. On the fourth floor there was a ballroom (currently the B. Rumiński Hall A), and club rooms (currently the J. Bukowski Hall B) and offices.

From he beginning of World War I until July 1915, the upper halls of Dom Technika were leased free of charge by a hospital run by the Polish Committee for Sanitation. During World War II, and especially after the fall of the Warsaw Uprising, Dom Technika was burnt down, many statues were destroyed, including the front-end figures of Daedalus and Icarus. The decorative ceiling of the main staircase, which represented the Renaissance, or the march of humanity through the fire of revolution towards a better future, painted by Stanisław Bohusz-Siestrzeńcewicz, was totally damaged.

Despite the enormity of devastation caused to the Polish economy, the surviving Polish engineers and technicians, who found themselves in destroyed Warsaw just after the war, undertook to rebuild Dom Technika, an initiative which took shape after a meeting of NOT’s Organisational Committee on 12 December 1945. The building was rehabilitated within a short time, and despite its old age (110 years!), it continues to serve new generations of Polish en• gineers and technicians.

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Food Industry

SELLING THE POTENTIAL OF THE POLISH FOOD INDUSTRY For more than 30 years, Polagra Food has promoted Polish food and supported domestic entrepreneurs seeking expansion on to foreign markets. Miłosz Jankowiak, Project Director of Polagra Food, tells “Polish Market” about the event’s objectives and how its format has evolved over the years.

Polagra Food is an event with a very long tradition. How has Central and Eastern Europe’s most important food industry event changed over time?

The first edition of Polagra was held in 1985 under the name International Fair of Agricultural and Food Industry Polagra-Agroexpo.

The scope of that exhibition was very wide: machinery and equipment for cultivation and stock farming, food and catering machinery and equipment, chemicals used in agriculture, agri-food products, seeds, seedlings, flowers, live animals, feed. The year 2000 marked the first major change in its format - the fair was organised into two specialised events: International Agricultural Fair Polagra-Farm devoted to farming and International Fair of Food Industry Polagra Food exhibiting food and catering machinery and equipment as well as food products. Polagra Food underwent further modifications. For several years now, the so-called Polagra block includes three specialised events: International Fair of Food Processing Technologies Polagra Tech, International Fair of Food Products Polagra Food and International Gastronomy Fair Polagra Gastro.

PM

PM

Are these three specialised events that you mentioned held simultaneously? Why is that?

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These events are strongly intertwined, especially in the case of Polagra Food and Polagra Tech: the exhibitors of the first one, namely food producing companies, are visitors of Polagra Tech. Likewise, food manufacturers offer options of interest to restaurateurs. As you can see, these events have points of contact.

Therefore, in order to harness their potential, we decided that Polagra Food, Polagra Tech and Polagra Gastro should be held at the same time. This allows the grocery and catering industry to meet in one place at one time, putting the Polagra block among the most comprehensive events of its kind.

Polagra has been breaking records in terms of the number of visitors. The 2015 edition was visited by over 60 thousand people. The fair enjoys enormous confidence from exhibiting companies. Its success is primarily due to the fact that it keeps monitoring the situation of domestic food companies. The basic principle underlying Polagra Food remains a continuous dialogue with food producers. This makes us well placed creating a tailor-made meeting platform. Already now, in preparation for the 2016 edition, we are holding talks with Polish entrepreneurs to learn about their expectations as to the upcoming edition, with a special consideration of their target countries in terms of exports. We are keen to show the potential of the Polish food industry as effectively

as possible because we have much to be proud of. The food sector is considered Polish specialty, Polish food is appreciated not only for its quality, but also for its taste. Every year, domestic producers surprise us with a huge amount of novelties, which proves that Polish producers keep a close watch on the market and adapt their offerings to changes in consumption patterns.

And how does Polagra Food support entrepreneurs on the domestic market?

For exhibitors, Polagra Food is primarily a marketing key to the door of food distributors. It is at Polagra that new meat and dairy products, processed fruit and vegetables have their premieres. Speaking of the marketing aspect of Polagra Food, I cannot omit to mention the PIF Gold Medal awarded to the best products. Its winners always stress that the prize helps them in building the image of the product itself and of the company.

PM

When is the next edition of Polagra Food planned?

The next edition will be held on 26-29 September 2016. Naturally, it will be preceded by the Tastes of Regions, which is a regional, traditional and certified food festival.

• PM

Food Industry

GOPLANA & SOLIDARNOŚĆ

the kingdom of chocolates and pralines Goplana and Solidarność are two Polish confectionery traditions. The first has specialized in chocolate products for over a hundred years, bringing out what’s most magical in chocolate. Solidarność is the undisputed expert in creating delicious fillings, which won recognition through pralines combining a variety of flavours and textures.

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t the beginning of the year Goplana has undergone a metamorphosis. The introduction of a renewed graphic design was accompanied by an extension of the offer by new formats and unique new products.

The portfolio of the Goplana brand has been broadened by chocolate candies and chocolate bars with fillings of popular pralines made by Solidarność.

Goplana and Solidarność brands are the perfect duo.

Goplana provides delicious chocolate and Solidarność makes delicious fillings. As a result of collaboration between these two strong complementary brands, a unique product is created that stands out because of the highest quality of raw materials, intriguing connections and delicious taste.

Together, Goplana and Solidarność form a perfect composition of excellent filling and velvet-smooth chocolate. Now the lovers of both brands can enjoy new chocolate bars combined with fillings of chocolates and candy made by Solidarność. You can choose from: Nałęczowska Plum, Golden Nut, Pistachio, Choco Choco, Toffino and Mister Ron. Each flavour will inspire you with rich taste and is a delicious complement of important moments in life. Great for special occasions, meetings with relatives and to enjoy the sweet taste of everyday life. Perfect for a gift or as addition to gifts.

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12/2015 polish market

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Food Industry

“MEAT FROM POLAND” AT POLAGRA

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he Polish Association of Butchers and Meat Processors has again had its promotional stand “Meat from Poland” during Polagra Food andPolagra-Tech 2015. Central Europe’s largest exhibition of food producers and manufacturers of machinery and equipment for the food industry is organised by the Poznań International Fair.

“Meat from Poland” was neighbouring with the 21st Butchery and Meat Delicatessen Forum, which hosted culinary demonstrations and nationwide deli meat competitions, held under the auspices of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. More than 100 deli meats were put forward for evaluation by the competition jury. Some of them were also assessed by visitors, and it is precisely the opinion of consumers that is considered extremely important, and awards for the best producer, selected by the consumer jury, are the confirmation of good taste and high quality.

Polagra’s “Meat from Poland” stand, which is a kind of representation of the meat sector, has traditionally been a meeting place for members of industry organisations. Most of them participate in Polagra to learn about the offerings of manufacturers of machinery and equipment, presented at the Exhibition of Meat Processing Technologies, which opens its doors every two years. During the four exhibition days, “Meat from Poland” becomes the venue for butchers and meat processors from the whole country. Here, members of industry organisations can meet with chief managers, discuss in various configurations the current situation in the meat processing industry at home and abroad, attend seminars, contests, culinary demonstrations and tastings. Tastings and culinary demonstrations are what lures many meat gourmands to “Meat from Poland”. Distributors and consumers are willing to participate in tasting the products, seeking novelties, which are often rooted in the tradition of Polish butchery. Combining that old school with modernity often brings surprising results. Polish butchers repeat that drawing upon tradition and regionalism, coupled

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with the skillful use of traditional flavours in modern technologies, is a way to conquering the market increasingly shaped by demanding consumers.

Members of the Polish Association of Butchers and Meat Processors participated in numerous events accompanying Polagra Food

and Polagra-Tech. These included a conference and gala celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Agricultural Market Agency; the “Get to Know Good Food” gala; a conference on labelling organised by the Polish Federation of Food Producers and the Gold Medal of Poznań International Fair Gala.

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Władysław Ortyl, Marshal of the Podkarpackie Region, receives the award for promoting environmental protection

Winners of the awards for promoting environmental protection granted by “Polish Market” during the Pearls of the Polish Economy gala

Polish Market, a monthly magazine, which has for almost 20 years served Poland by promoting its economic accomplishments, successfulentrepreneursand splendid culture, wishes You a happy Holiday Season and a prosperous New Year.

AMS DLA MIAST 10 EDYCJI PROGRAMU BRAMY KRAJU / KONKURSY ARCHITEKTONICZNE NA ZAGOSPODAROWANIE PRZESTRZENI GDAŃSKA, KRAKOWA I WROCŁAWIA / PIONIERSKIE INWESTYCJE W REWITALIZOWANYCH OBSZARACH SZCZECINA, WARSZAWY I WROCŁAWIA

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GALERIA PLAKATU AMS 16 EDYCJI / 7 000 NADESŁANYCH PROJEKTÓW / 30 000 WYDRUKOWANYCH PLAKATÓW KAŻDA EDYCJA TO 6 500 000 WIDZÓW KAMPANII OUTDOOROWEJ Z NAGRODZONYMI PLAKATAMI (DANE AMS METRICS)

FUNDACJA AKADEMIA INTEGRACJI 317 SZKÓŁ / 573 POKAZY – LEKCJE INTEGRACJI / 49 500 DZIECI UCZESTNICZĄCYCH W PROGRAMIE 46 600 PRZEJECHANYCH KILOMETRÓW / OBOZY REHABILITACYJNE DLA DZIECI, DNI SPORTU, TURNIEJE W SZERMIERCE NA WÓZKACH

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