By Selga Laizane, Director of SIA Birojs 2000
On 17 August Birojs 2000 Is Celebrating Its First Anniversary
Although it seems as if a long way has been covered, it has been just a
year since Birojs 2000 was established. Last spring the Public Relations Unit of
the Latvian Privatisation Agency submitted their application for the tender announced by
the Ministry of Finance for the right to organise the EBRD Board of Governors' Annual
Meeting in Riga in May 2000. The hard work and efforts taken were crowned with success
– our proposal came first in the competition thereby a necessity arose to establish
an enterprise solely engaged in the organisation of the Meeting. Thus, on August 17 SIA Birojs
2000 was born, with Selga Laizane, Anda Kalnina and Maris Tiknuss embarking upon their
professional activities.
When marking anniversaries it is common practise to size up what has
been achieved. So what has Birojs 2000 done in a year's time?
The staff of Birojs 2000 has increased to eleven people to form
an excellent team capable of unceasingly perfecting their knowledge and professional
skills.
As the date of the Meeting is drawing closer, the amount of work to be
done is ever increasing. The specific nature of Birojs 2000 tasks is to carry out
all necessary preparatory work to arrange the Meeting by involving competent specialists
and experts, i.e. organise competitions and tenders to provide services and complete
repairs needed to host the Annual Meeting, which results in granting entrepreneurs state
procurement rights.
Fifteen competitions and tenders have already been announced, repair
work is well under way in several objects. Marketing and sponsorship offers have been
proposed to entrepreneurs, and one should admit that their interest and responsiveness are
on the rise.
Working in co-operation with central and local government institutions
and ministries a prominent event is going to be staged which will gather influential bank
and financial authorities of Europe. Our ability to promote the image of Latvia depends on
this project and it will probably be yet another step towards the European Union.
It makes me feel happy that information about the activities and
current issues of Birojs 2000 can now be found not only on the internet home page
and in our monthly Birojs 2000 ZINAS but also on the TV programme Dzivesvieta
(Abiding Place).
I would like to wish every success to the staff of Birojs 2000, our
partners and supporters, let's not lose our zeal for work and zest henceforth so that next
May the EBRD Board of Governors' Meeting may bring satisfaction for the work accomplished
and Riga may declare itself a world conference planning centre.
