Minister Martin Welcomes Ireland’s Higher Position In World Competitiveness League

The Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Mr. Micheál Martin, T.D., today (Thursday 11^th. May 2006) welcomed Ireland’s rise in the international competitiveness league table compiled by the IMD. Ireland has moved up one place to the 11^th most competitive economy in the world.

Speaking after the release of the International Institute for Management Development’s 2006 rankings Minister Martin said:

“Increasing competitiveness across all sectors of the economy is the key to sustaining economic growth, generating more employment opportunities and providing a profitable base from which companies can compete and win more business in world markets”

“Achieving recognition for our international competitiveness is not just a once a year event. Building and maintaining competitive capacity is a long-term and constant challenge. In the context of the current Partnership talks there is concern about the pace of growth in labour costs and productivity. These are big issues in assessing competitiveness. Wage moderation and higher productivity will be critical in giving our enterprise sector the ability to confidently compete in global markets”.

In this regard the Minister said: “Growth and prosperity are built on creating value and rewarding value creation. But we need to regain the balance between creating value and the reward expected for what we create”.

Pointing to some of the comments by the International Institute for Management Development on this years report, the Minister noted:

“High costs are in part evidence of new growth and prosperity. If reasonable levels of economic growth are to be achieved over the medium term cost increases above those faced by our competitors must be balanced by strong advances in productivity. The dynamic in our cost base must be restrained by realistic comparisons with our trading competitors”.

ENDS/ETE 1567