Essay contest

Maria Satarova: My name is Maria Satarova and I am the director of the EU Communications Strategy Department at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The subject of this competition was how can I profit from the Czech Republic's membership of the European Union.

Jan Jiha: My name is Honza Jiha, and I study Czech and Spanish at the Philosophy Faculty in Prague.

Radio Prague: What do you believe will be the greatest benefit for the Czech Republic if it accedes into the European Union?

JJ: I think peace and quietness. There are a lot of benefits, but I consider it more generally as an opportunity to live without fear of any danger."

RP: Do you believe that the average Czech citizen has enough information regarding the European Union?

JJ: Not at all. They don't bother. I think the young people, they do. They do have a lot of information and they want to know. But our nation in general? No.

MS: I think that it is quite difficult to give information to all the citizens, because they also have to be very active, to go and pick up information. We have regular public opinion polls, they show that people are quite well-informed especially young people and small and medium enterprises.

RP: What do you believe some of the ways to increase knowledge of the European Union would be?

JJ: Maybe if there were some European Union agents coming to Prague and to Czech pubs, talking to people and paying for their beer, it would be the way. But if we promote information programmes on the Internet and other media it may be better, but not much, because still the majority of people don't have any access to this media.