2023-07-11 10:54:00
A consultation opened Monday by the ECB allows citizens of the euro zone to choose the design of their future banknotes, put into circulation by 2030.
By JW with AFP Illustration of euro banknotes. © THIBAUT DURAND / Hans Lucas / Hans Lucas via AFP Published on 07/11/2023 at 10:54 a.m.
Since Monday, nationals of the European Union can choose the future pattern of their new banknotes, still in full design, about to change graphics. Among the illustrations in the running, “free” birds or rivers, proposed as part of a consultation launched by the European Central Bank (ECB).
“We want Europeans to recognize themselves in the design of the euro banknotes”, which is why “they will play an active role in the selection of the new theme, declared the President of the ECB, Christine Lagarde, in a press release.
The idea is that these new banknotes, which Europeans should not have in their hands before 2029 or 2030, speak more to citizens than the current motifs showing architectural styles without representing an actually existing monument or bridge.
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Seven proposed themes
All inhabitants of the euro zone can make their choice from Monday until the end of August, when this survey, which appears on ECB website. Seven themes were pre-selected by the Board of Governors of the Monetary Institute, which took into account suggestions from a group of experts.
Concrete themes relate to “birds: free, resilient and inspiring”, to the rivers criss-crossing Europe, or even to the “hands”, symbols of a Europe to be “built together”, according to the press release. Others, more abstract, evoke “European culture”, “our Europe and ourselves”, the “future” which “belongs to us” and the “reflection of European values in nature”.
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Several steps before the final decision
The ECB will use the results of this survey, as well as another, carried out among a representative sample of Europeans, to select the theme of the next series of banknotes “by 2024”, according to the communicated.
A graphic design competition will then be organised, which will give Europeans another opportunity to express their preferences, before the choice of the designs selected and the announcement of a timetable for issuing tickets in 2026.
A political choice
At the end of 2021, 20 years after the first euro banknotes were put into circulation, the Central Bank announced that it wanted to clean up their design. The choice of the first series had given rise to fiery debates on the subject in the 1990s.
Current banknotes show Romanesque or Gothic arches and other modern architectural elements, as Member States have never been able to agree on a selection of great figures embodying the history of the Old Continent.
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These States will also have a say in the choice of the future design of banknotes. In addition to being more meaningful for the younger generations of Europeans, these future banknotes will have to “prevent counterfeiting” and “reduce the impact on the environment”, declared Fabio Panetta, member of the ECB’s executive board, in the communicated.
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