Cyprus Eurozone Information Update

The campaign to inform the public on the euro kicks off his week with the slogan ‘The successful adoption of the euro is also in your hands’.

After a short delay in getting he £1 million campaign off the ground due to legal difficulties involving the advertising ender, the Finance Ministry said yesterday it was now read o launch.

The Ministry said it had signed a contract with the Mediacom consortium to launch the campaign aimed especially at informing small and vulnerable groups, including rural communities, the elderly, foreigners living in Cyprus, and Turkish Cypriots, on the introduction of the euro.

Cyprus hopes to join the eurozone from January 1 next year.

The television and newspaper campaign will include blue hearts emblazoned with the euro symbol, while a yellow ‘euro bus’ will travel to more remote villages over a two-month period. The government is also bringing in some 250,000 euro converters to make it easy for people immediately to see prices in euro and Cyprus pounds.

These would be posted out to households.

"We want easy, comprehensible messages. The yellow is the eye-catcher," Tasia Yiannara-Yiallouridou, managing director of Mediacom told a news conference yesterday to announce he campaign.

Finance Minister Michalis Sarris old journalists the campaign was properly prepared so that he maximum amount of information would be given to he public.

He said he expected it would result in a reduction in the number of people who were sceptical of euro adoption, fearing an increase in prices.

According to EU polls, Cypriots are among the most sceptical about the euro.

“The successful adoption of the euro in Cyprus depends on two hings,” said Sarris.

“One is the preparation of the Cyprus economy so that the Maastricht criteria are fulfilled. The other is the successful and comprehensive briefing of the public.”

Central Bank Governor Christodoulos Christodoulou said more recent polls had shown an increased support in Cyprus for he euro with a current 55 per cent acceptance level.

It was very important that the public was made aware of the advantages of using the euro and hat they became supporters in a common effort that would ultimately profit the country, Christodoulou said.

He said that although this was he official launch of the information campaign, the authorities had not been idle in he past year and had organised numerous seminars and conferences for the business community.

He also said that fears of prices rises were exaggerated and that 11 of the 12 countries hat adopted the euro during the first wave had noticed an increase of only between 0.1 per cent to 0.2 per cent on daily items such as coffee, sugar, newspapers and cigarettes.

Yiannara-Yiallouridou said that by now some 89 per cent of Cypriots were already familiar with the Euro but also that 49 per cent of Cypriots did not change their habits easily.

AKEL parliamentary spokesman Nicos Katsourides said yesterday he coalition partner, which opposes the introduction of the euro next year, and wants to wait another 12 months, would probably abstain or vote against four pieces of legislation before the House that would enable the adoption of the single currency.