Обележавање Јубилеја СИТС - говор г-дина Dirk Bochara, генералног секретара FEANI на свечаној академији СИТС 

When Mr Igor MARIC, asked me to prepare for a speech on the occasion of the 150th Birthday of the Union of Engineers and Technicians of Serbia, he recommended me to focus on the influence which FEANI – as the European Professional Federation for the Engineering Profession – has had and still has with the European Institutions, with other national and international engineering associations and with the engineering community at large. In developing and taking that influence, many aspects need to be considered.

Since its foundation in 1951 FEANI has developed a track record of robustness and soundness. The Organization was of course in its pioneering years much smaller and so was the EU. Today FEANI has National Members from 34 different countries from the European Higher Education Area (EHEA). This implies a fundamentally different dynamic as 70 years ago, it requires different ways of communicating and of determining the corporate agenda, it implies more complicated and slower decision making processes.

A major function in taking influence is to ensure that while thinking together through dialogue, we succeed in finding the right answers to today’s questions. Those relate to both “how”-questions as well as to “why”-questions. For that I believe an Organization like FEANI does not only need the input of the academic world, but especially and more increasingly from the business and industry world. It is always better to sow questions from various angles than to plant exclamation marks centrally. We can only become fully-fledged and influential with the help of our stakeholders and we can only improve thanks to our 34 National Members. In this fragility and interdependence lays also great strength which should enable us to accept that it is better to hurt ourselves with the truth, than to comfort ourselves with a lie or an illusion. Consequently, we believe in FEANI that “mobility of engineers” is no longer the main priority of our corporate agenda, whereas we have developed – undeniably so – several valuable instruments in the past to facilitate that mobility with our EUROPEAN ENGINEERING EDUCATION DATABASE, the EUR ING title and the Engineering Card. Especially our EUR ING title was recognized by the EU Commission as an example of a self-regulating profession.

Last October, FEANI has retuned its corporate strategic agenda for the next years. This will be a slow but rewarding process which ties in the points of view of all our National Members, but also of industry representatives, employer associations, businesses from a variety of sectors in which engineers are employed, academics, students and policy-makers. By doing so we hope to develop sustainable and collaborative long-term relationships with them. In addition to this important project, we will continue to be involved with engineering education and the way of teaching engineers in Europe, putting emphasis on their learning outcomes. We were for instance, recently involved with the development of common training principles for engineers while putting emphasis on the learning outcomes.

As FEANI we are an associated partner in several EU-funded projects under ERSASMUS+ (DG EAC) which are geared towards the promotion of STEM and the future roles of engineers in society. We have an input to the EU Commission (DG Trade) about Free Trade Agreements which are in the making and the issue of Mutual Recognition of diplomas therein. We try to provide information on new market requirements for engineers through our connections with BUSINESSEUROPE, we inform our National Members on current and future career and employment opportunities; we promote the professional status and the image of the engineer at the European institutions; we consider initiatives on continuous professional development and LLL for engineers, etc. In all this our National Members must determine themselves what benefits their individual members the most. On top of this, we are also rather confident that the “sense of belonging to an engineering community” is surely considered a benefit by many of the engineering professionals. Not all benefits are quantifiable.

From my interactions with industry I feel a great appreciation for engineers as “problem-solvers”, in all countries of our network. They are known and recognized for having received “challenged based education”, for being “hands-on” and for having “innovation competences”. Much has been said and written about engineers not having sufficient soft skills, but also in that area a lot has changed over the last ten years and today many engineers demonstrate their interdisciplinary skills successfully in both small and larger companies.

As FEANI we are the only European Federation for all engineers, first and second cycle alike (Bachelor and Master). We must realize the speed of societal change which implies that formal education will no longer be able in all its dimensions to keep up pace anymore. Informal and non-formal education, as well as vocational training, will therefore become increasingly more important. Main societal challenges are the speed of technological change, as well as the discrepancy we are experiencing individually between “the known” and the “to be known”. People like Da Vinci or Erasmus probably knew in their time 90% of what there was to be known, but today smart people know perhaps 1% or less of what there is to be known between heaven and earth. We think we are becoming smarter, but in fact we can speak of the relative decreasing knowledge and the relative increase of ignorance. The paramount requirement that knowledge in combination with skills is the only way to successfully acquire professional competence, also causes stress and insecurity to many people who have difficulty keeping up with the pace. Internet and social media can support and help us in sharing valuable information within seconds, in extending our personal networks, in taking influence, etc. when used properly.  

As FEANI we are supportive to these iniatives of Lifelong Learning and we will continue to influence and convince the European policy makers of this necessity.

The total number of engineers in our network (which includes Turkey and Russia) is probably around 6 million, but the number of course depends on how you define an engineer or how you define a European network. Europe (EU = 27 or 28 countries, or EHEA = 48 countries). As FEANI we do not claim to ensure full coverage of the individual interests of each of them. We focus on a limited number of objectives such as listed above. We consider our 34 National Engineering Federations as our Members and have very little direct contact with our “members’ members” so to speak. Yet, it is important that these individual engineers are aware that their national federation is represented and interlinked at European and international level in a wide variety of areas.  In this regard FEANI has co-operation agreements in place with BEST, the European Engineering Students, as well as with EYE (the European Young Engineers).

We are eager to look together with you into new strategic areas of activities, especially with regard to better connecting with the business and political world, but also with each other as National Members. To that end, we have set up the FEANI National Members Forum a few years ago where “best practices” are shared and at which occasionally experts from outside provide a presentation on an important topic, such as on EFSI or the “Knowledge Alliances” under ERASMUS+, etc. We are in the process of setting up an “Engineers Europe Advisory Group” with representatives from industry as well as academia and perhaps even politicians (MEPs).

Ultimately our Organization will evolve as an “Engineers Europe” and in that sense, we will be able to gain weight and to speak with one voice with our counterparts in other continents. Our Organization is like life itself : a process of “being” and “becoming” in which “becoming” becomes “being”. The most common expectation is surely that as FEANI we continue to be considered as a valuable stakeholder in the relationship with the European Institutions.

My final message is that engineers must not consider the future of Europe too negatively as being the shrinking continent where economic growth stagnates, where productivity decreases, where our good ideas are being realised on other continents and where our attempts to unify Europe are considered as having failed. 

It is true that Europe only represents 7% anymore of the total world population, but we still represent 20% of total worldwide production and 50% of the total social expenses. We can be  proud about that, young and senior engineers alike. Both the EU Institutions as well as industry are very aware of the important role engineers have played in achieving these accomplishments. Europe is small but nice, with a high quality of life which also becomes apparent in our long life expectancy. We have socially and ecologically corrected free market economies, political pluralistic democracies in which the executive and the legal forces act independently and autonomously from each other, we have social welfare states who protect citizens against the most evil risks in life.   Which continent can claim all that? In addition, the former President of the EU Commission was a Chemical Engineer and the current Secretary General of the UN is a Mechanical Engineer. Just two examples to indicate that politics overall do support engineers and vice versa. I am pleased and honoured to be here today at the Academy and on behalf of the FEANI community, I thank you for your kind invitation and look forward to a continued, successful cooperation.