Multinationals still investing in Ireland

[caption id="attachment_69082" align="aligncenter" width="600" caption="The IDA's Barry O'Leary."]

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Ireland's unemployment rate is very high, but it's certain that it would be a good deal higher still but for a bumper year for overseas investment in 2011.

Indeed, the year just concluded was a record one in terms of investments in the Republic by multinational companies.

IDA Ireland, which works in the U.S. and elsewhere around the world to lure direct foreign investment to Irish shores, revealed that 148 new investments were lured to all parts of Irish industry last year.

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"Ireland continued to win significant foreign direct investment in 2011, despite a difficult economic environment," IDA chief executive Barry O'Leary said.

"Most encouraging has been the increase in job numbers and the rise in the number of investments from IDA client companies," he said.

More than 13,000 new jobs were created by IDA client companies in 2011, a 20 percent increase from the 10,897 created in 2010, the Irish Independent reported.

The 148 investments secured by IDA was a rise of 17 percent on the previous year, with 61 of those from multinational companies investing in Ireland for the first time, and 87 made by existing client companies, the report stated.

Twitter, Intel, IBM, PayPal, Coca-Cola and Pfizer were among the organizations to make a significant investment, it added.

"Export-led growth, particularly in services, is adding to the employment portfolio of IDA's clients, which created over 13,000 new jobs in 2011," said O'Leary.

At the same time, however, the loss of jobs in Ireland's multinational sector had a dampening effect as it reduced the net job gain to a little over 6,000.

Meanwhile, the latest figures from the Irish government's Central Statistics Office reveal that the Republic's jobless rate dropped a little in December, by 3,300 to a total of 443,200. In percentage terms the drop was from 14.4 percent to 14.3 percent.

"If we are to create the numbers of new jobs we need in order to address the massive employment challenges we face, we must build aggressively on the major strengths we have in the foreign multinational sector," said jobs minister Richard Bruton.

"Through this month's Action Plan for Jobs I will be using these strengths both to support our indigenous companies and to attract ever more dynamic multinational operations to Ireland. In this way we can ensure that we build on 2011's major achievements and address the jobs crisis in a real way," Bruton said.

 

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