As an international non-profit-making association, the ETUI-REHS has been set up to conduct research and provide scientific, educational and technical support to the ETUC and its affiliates and to contribute to the development of Social Europe and social dialogue . This is the broad and basic mission of the Institute, reflected in article 3 of the Statutes, decided upon by the General Assembly of the ETUI-REHS on the 1 ^st December 2004. This is to be achieved via research, professional expertise, engineering and ergonomic involvement and training activities that help produce relevant knowledge, experience and support for the ETUC and other stakeholders. To establish itself as the central European knowledge and competence centre requires the ETUI-REHS to be a network-steering body that can organize and coordinate numerous academic and trade union activities, while also displaying and using its competences in arranging conferences, meetings, and workshops both in Western-, Central and Eastern Europe. Consolidated activities of the institute will to a large extent depend on the further development of such kinds of networking arrangements. At the same time the work must aim at securing the Institute the competences, capabilities and financial means necessary to conduct action-oriented research, provide expertise and to give relevant policy advice and recommendations.