This time next year we will be in the midst of millennium madness - both of the good and bad kind - but this new year we will be at the start of a new development of huge but largely unpredictable consequence. The euro, the new European currency, will have started on its rocky path to replace most EU currencies by 2003. On New Year's Eve, ECOFIN, European economic and finance ministers, meets in Brussels to finalise the exchange rates for the 11 currencies joining EMU; around the world, including Dublin, financiers will be working over the holiday period to cope with any turbulence and ensure an easy opening on the markets on Monday morning.
The momentous occasion, the culmination of years of plotting and planning, will be marked in different ways throughout the community. The Brussels plan to release 3,000 balloons outside the ministers' meeting has run into much hostile criticism. Some believe it is environmentally incorrect; others feel balloons send out the wrong message about EU monetary policy, i.e. hot air, hollow inside and soaraway inflation. Nonetheless, the Eurocrats were so enthused with balloons, they planned to release many more, but 3,000 was the limit without getting clearance from Belgian air traffic control.
At home the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, will throw a party in Leinster House to coincide with the euro launch and the announcement of the conversion rates. All members of the Oireachtas, MEPs and the social partners will be invited and given the inevitable information packs. Charlie McCreevy will be holding the fort at ECOFIN, but whether the other worthies want to spend New Year's Eve in Leinster House, euro launch or not, is debatable.
The idea of surprises in the rates is totally ruled out by all and sundry in the euro business. What was it they called our punt at the very beginning? A flat-bottomed vessel with a tendency to sink.