LISBON, Feb. 7 (Xinhua) -- Leaders of Spain, Italy and Portugal discussed the future of work at the COTEC Europe Summit in Mafra, near Lisbon, on Wednesday.
The summit is an annual event held to discuss changing business practices and technology. The three member countries of Spain, Italy and Portugal alternate as hosts. The title of this year's summit was "WORK 4.0: Rethinking the Human-Technology Alliance".
Portugal President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa said that technological change was inevitable, but argued that its pace and nature could nevertheless be managed.
"It will be more or less fast, more or less harsh and, above all else, more or less fair depending on how it is responded to, not to mention anticipated, by a 4.0 European Union, 4.0 political systems and 4.0 social systems," the president told the summit's 400-odd delegates.
"In other words," he continued, "an environment adjusted to suit the digital era that maximizes advantages and minimizes weaknesses within European institutions."
Italian president Sergio Mattarella also gave a Europe-focused speech.
"Research and innovation have always been the keys to progress," he said, "and to the extraordinary advances that have allowed our societies to lead lives that are unprecedented in history and enabled Europe to continue to represent a place of increased well-being."
For this to remain the case, "it is in the European Union's interest that our voices be heard in Brussels".
Mattarella said that Italy, Portugal and Spain offered "a different and specific perspective" and that "the Mediterranean context is now, more than ever, a place for meeting the global challenges of today."
For his part, the King of Spain, Felipe VI, advocated teaching "digital skills" in schools, but stressed that the emphasis should be on the human.
"We don't know what machines will be capable of in the medium term but we do know what men and women are capable of," he said, "which is good news because it enables us to prepare society for a more automated economy and focus our educational system on the competitive advantages of the human being."
"Work 4.0" is a concept first put forward in Germany in 2016. It serves as a framework to analyse and imagine social changes related to working lives in a digital age.
The title references "Industry 4.0", a term used to describe the so-called fourth industrial revolution. The first was powered by steam, the second by electricity and the third by computerization. The fourth will be characterized by mass automation and algorithms.
