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The President of the Republic at the ceremony "The Enterprise Award 2001", on June 3, 2002, at Lillepaviljon03.06.2002
Honourable Mr Minister,
Distinguished Entrepreneurs,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Unfortunately, as a rule, the bad news tends to hit the headlines. And so it is rather exceptional that the public becomes aware of good achievements, and of thanks and credit given for the work done. That's the very reason why I am pleased to be here today thanking on behalf of the Estonian state our most successful enterprises.
The Estonian Enterprise Award stands for a great credit. The example of those having earned the award encourages also other entrepreneurs, both the present ones and those to be. In this context, the enterprise award is in a way an investment in the future.
Estonia being such a small country we have to locate all the talented people and engage all the hands available in order to safeguard our successful development. This too, is investment in future - in the future of our state.
No doubt, all the entrepreneurs gathered here today are characterized by gift, for the spirit of enterprise is a gift. A saying goes that great achievements take one per cent of genius but the rest is hard work. Our zeal to work, our will to learn and our responsibility to future generations have helped us to overcome the hurdles sheer hosts of which have been placed by history across our way of progress.
The aforementioned qualities - the will to work, willingness to learn and responsibility - definitely characterize all those entrepreneurs and companies we are honouring here today. On top of that, the enterprise award acknowledges innovation and development, quality and competitiveness based on them.
We also are acknowledging these properties here the impact of which cannot be measured in money alone. By this I mean the role of an entrepreneur as champion of local life. The benefit resulting from an enterprise successfully operating in a region of high unemployment rate cannot be equated with just the invested money only. An enterprise creating jobs for those who otherwise would not have the chance of winning bread for their families with their own hands, or an enterprise helping to make local environment cleaner, to improve the infrastructure there.
What I want to say is that the enterprise award is tantamount to a great responsibility. We take the recipients of the award as examples saying by that: this is just the kind of Estonia we want to have, that's the way we are building us a better future.
Having in mind the future of Estonia, I do hope that year after year the selection of the award-winners became harder: harder due to the circumstance that there will be ever more candidates worth of serving as an example.
I wish you every success!
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