Job losses at EI firms set to continue

LAST year’s pattern of approximately 8,000 more jobs being lost in Enterprise Ireland (EI) supported companies than were created, is likely to be broadly repeated this year, management at state development agency, EI said yesterday.

The agency’s latest annual report, published yesterday, showed thatalthough just over 10,500 jobs were created among Enterprise Ireland-supported firms last year, 18,525 were lost.

The 8,000 jobs deficit brought total employment levels among Enterprise Ireland-supported companies to 145,758 people as of the end of last year.

Apart from the net loss in employment, the agency pointed to investment in R&D projects and export sales as areas where its client companies performed strongly.

Indeed, the annual report also detailed how EI client companies achieved new export sales of €1.3 billion last year. While slightly down on 2007 figures, this level of business still managed to boost total export value by 3% to €14.3bn; representing a record year for export growth.

Commenting on this, Enterprise Ireland’s chairman Hugh Cooney said: “To grow exports at a time of global economic slowdown is an achievement. Yet that is exactly what Irish businesses did in 2008. That this was achieved in the face of contracting international markets is a credit to the tenacity and resilience of those Irish enterprises that continue to compete for and win new business overseas.”

When questioned about the prospect for the new jobs-to-lost-jobs ratio for this year, EI chief executive Frank Ryan said it was too early to judge – mainly because the agency wouldn’t be publishing its latest annual review of employment until October.

However, Mr Ryan did add that it was likely that 2009’s figures would be at “roughly the same level as last year”.

“We probably won’t see a positive increase in jobs until there is a large increase in new export orders and June was the first month, so far this year that we saw positive movement on that front,” he said.