The National Euro Changeover Committee launched an information campaign yesterday and appealed for the public to get in touch with them to clear up any enquires or misconceptions they may have about the new currency. The theme of the campaign is “The euro… it’s in our interest.”

NECC chairman Joseph F.X. Zahra introduced the five information officers who will be handling queries and announced that the first phase of the campaign involved the setting up of information 154 – a new telephone number that people can call to request any information on the subject.

He said that public interest in the euro was increasing and this was clear from the participation in the choice of the face for the “Maltese euro” coins.

“It is very interesting to note that with two days left in the voting for the euro face, some 33,000 valid votes have been received,” he said.

Mr Zahra said it was clear that the general public was thirsty for information on the subject, but the NECC said it was going to build up the campaign in a gradual manner because there was still 18 months to go before the earliest date at which Malta can adopt the euro as currency, which is 1 January 2008.

He said that the campaign would start to hit top gear some time near October. “It is important that we look at this next step of adopting the euro as a natural progression of our joining the European Union. The NECC will be doing its utmost to ensure that the change will be one without jolts and will be keeping the public updated at every step,” he said.

“It must be a step-by-step approach,” said Mr Zahra, “but the closer we get to E-Day, the more information we will pump out.”

He explained that the thrust of the campaign will be that adopting the single currency is a positive thing and it is therefore in everyone’s interest to do so.

“It is undoubtedly an advantage for a small country such as ours to adopt the second largest currency in the world, which is used by 320 million people. This is a historic transition and everyone should participate. Participation leads to a sharing of information, so everyone should do so,” he said.

While the NECC already has a website, said Mr Zahra, it will be redesigned in the near future to make it more interactive. “It is a popular site, and we have been seeing more and more visitors. We encourage people to leave comments or to ask questions if they need to. People can go through our website on www.euro.gov.mt or they can send email directly to euro@ gov.mt.”

Mr Zahra pointed out that from what has been learned so far, the general public seems to be more interested in the practical aspects of conversion, such as inflation and increased prices. “But from what has been learnt in other countries, if one removes the factors of inflation caused by the increase in international oil prices, adoption of the euro as currency only reflected a 0.3 per cent increase in inflation,” he said.

He also touched upon the issue of dual pricing and said that the euro will still be regarded as a foreign currency up to 1 January 2008, if Malta adopts it on that date.

Up until then, he said, banks will still impose a charge for conversion. “But businesses will be obliged to list their prices in lira and euro according the central parity rate of 4.293,” he said.

Executive director Alan Camilleri also spoke on the issue of rounding and smoothing. He explained that shop owners will be obliged to calculate the conversion of lira in euro and display both prices. “But if someone prices something at 1 euro 10.7896 cents, the practice is to round it to the nearest cent, so in this case you would have a price of 1 euro 11 cents,” he explained.

He said that smoothing comes into effect when a shop owner might decide to round something down from 21.4 euros to 20 euros . “But in that case, they must recalculate the Maltese price to reflect the change,” he said.

In conclusion, when asked about the withdrawal of the GRTU from discussions on the introduction of the euro, Mr Zahra said: “The door is always open. We want feedback... therefore need to exploit this possibility to make more progress for Malta. This is another historic step in our country’s development.”