‘Foreign direct investment down almost 50%’

THE high cost of doing business in Ireland has caused the level of foreign direct investment to drop by nearly 50%, it was claimed last night.

The amount invested by foreign companies fell from €22.1 billion in 2003 to €11.6bn last year.

Fine Gael said that the figures, which were contained in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)’s foreign direct investment report (FDI), showed the country was losing out to low-cost countries like India and China.