Minister welcomes positive CSO trade figs

Minister for Trade and Commerce, Michael Ahern today welcomed provisional trade statistics released by the CSO for 2004.

“The figures indicate that exports increased by 2.3% for the year over 2003, a very positive out-turn for a year in which trading conditions remained complex,” commented the Minister.

Overall, exports to the European Union increased by 2.5% in the January – November period, the latest period for which final statistics are available.

The EU continues to dominate our export trade, accounting for 62.2% of the total.

There was a slight fall in the exports to the ten new EU Member countries of 1.8%.

The US remains our largest export market despite a fall of 1.8% in exports, principally due to the falling value of the dollar. The US still accounts for 20% of our total exports.

Exports to China and Hong Kong continued their significant surge upwards, and amounted to €1.34bn in the January – November period, an increase of 19% over the same period in 2003.