So far so good but 2014 is a year of two halves

This year has seen a lot of very robust data on the Irish economy, pointing to a strong rebound in activity. This was confirmed by the National Accounts data published last week for the first half of the year.

These showed that GNP rose by 6% during the first half of 2014, compared to the previous year — with GDP up by 5.75%. This makes Ireland the strongest growing economy in the EU. The figures were well ahead of expectations and have caused economists to mark their growth projections for Ireland significantly upwards this year. Somewhat ironically, last week also saw a major downward revision by the OECD to its growth forecasts for the major G7 economies.

Exports have been the main engine of growth in the economy in recent years, and performed particularly strongly in the opening half of 2014, rising by some 10%. There was a rebound in goods exports as the impact on the expiry of patents on pharmaceutical exports abated. Meanwhile, service exports continued to grow strongly.