Dear friends, dear colleagues,

It is my honor and pleasure to welcome you at the Joint 13th IFSA World Congress and 6th EUSFLAT Conference! It is the first time that the European Society for Fuzzy Logic and Technology celebrates its biannual conference jointly with the well-established IFSA World Congress. Since 1999, our conference has become a well-known and well-established event in the international soft computing community. To organize a congress jointly with the International Fuzzy Systems Association is one more sign of recognition of our society. I am convinced that this event will help to foster interaction between European researchers and researchers from outside Europe. This was one of the key motivations for EUSFLAT to organize a joint congress, and I suppose this is one of the key motivations for IFSA as well.

Although this should not be the only motivation to attend a conference, it is surely no disadvantage for us that we have the pleasure to celebrate this unique joint congress in Lisbon, one of the most beautiful and vibrant cities in Europe (and even in the whole world). I hope that you enjoy your stay in this great location and that, at least for the time of the regular conference program, you somehow manage to resist the temptations this gorgeous city offers you.

That we have the opportunity to celebrate such a unique congress at such a unique place would have been impossible without the help of numerous people. On behalf of all more or less anonymous co-workers, I want to thank the two general chairs João Sousa and Uzay Kaymak and João Carvalho. I have to pay tribute to Didier Dubois and João Carvalho who, in their capacity as program chairs, are responsible for the high scientific quality of this conference. Finally, I also want to thank Janusz Kacprzyk and IFSA for the excellent cooperation during the preparation of the conference.

Most importantly, I want to thank all participants for their interest in this conference and for sharing their latest research results with us. I wish all of you a most successful event, interesting discussions, new ideas and insights, and pleasant days in Lisbon!