Signs of hope in industry, tourism

THE problem of rural isolation has been greatly exacerbated by the downturn in the economy.

A tightening of the jobs market means that most of the available employment is in big population centres. This leads to a migration from the countryside to the larger towns and cities.

Emigration is even more prevalent in the current economic climate. While the age-old scourge drains all communities, the absence of a large cohort of young people is felt keenest in rural areas.

There are three mainstays of the rural economy, and only one is doing well. Agriculture and tourism keep rural Ireland going, with farming bucking the recessionary trend.

Manufacturing as a source of good jobs went into decline in the late 1990s. David Meredith, a Teagasc economist, points to the rise in construction activity as a pivotal feature of this change.

“At that time manufacturing couldn’t pay the wages that were being offered in the construction industry,” he says.

“They couldn’t compete so they closed down. This wasn’t picked up on for some time, it simply wasn’t seen as an issue because there was so much employment around.”

The pull of construction through the first half of the last decade was more acutely felt in rural Ireland. In the Border, Midlands and West region, which contains 13 counties from Donegal to Laois, 60% of jobs created between 2002 and 2006 was in construction.

“There was a huge over-reliance on one industry,” says Meredith.

“Cities at least have a much larger mix of activities, but if you look at places from Inishowen, Co Donegal, down to Clonakilty or Skibbereen in Co Cork, 40% of males were working in construction. The biggest percentage increase in the Live Register is now in areas like that.”

Tackling unemployment in rural areas has its own difficulties. Whenever a large factory or facility closes in the major urban centres a task force is appointed and great focus is brought to the task of finding alternative employment.

In rural areas, job losses are delivered in more random manner. Redundancies do not come in large batches. Instead there are a few jobs here and a few there.

“There would be many households now in rural areas in particular where both parties are out of work,” says Meredith.

“There is a degree of pride in trying to keep this to themselves in some places, but there is a real risk of returning to the high levels of rural poverty which were experienced in the ’80s.”

One of the main planks of industrial development — the attraction of foreign direct investment — is not available to rural Ireland. Last month, IDA chief executive Barry O’Leary acknowledged that Dublin, Galway and Cork were the main beneficiaries of such investment. The companies being attracted are not interested in moving outside the main population centres.

“In the case of many companies we would have put packages of a couple of million on the table to incentivise them to some of the gateway [towns] and they’re gone to non-granted areas,” he said.

However, with an increase in competitiveness over the past three years as prices have come down, there have been signs of some recovery in the manufacturing sector in rural Ireland.

“(The country) is undergoing a further round of industrial restructuring at present,” says Meredith.

“So while construction in general is in decline, sub-sections within the industry are growing, such as renovation and maintenance services.”

In practical terms, this means that small manufacturing operations employing 10 and more people are making a comeback.

Farming is also making a comeback, but from a low base. The 2010 National Farm Survey showed a 48% increase in incomes from the previous year. The average income on Irish farms last year was €18,022. Dairy and tillage have made strong recoveries from 2009.

There are 99,500 farm holdings in the country, of which 29,154 are classified as big enough to justify at least one labour unit.

Tourism is also seeing a comeback, although again from a very low base. CSO figures show that in the second quarter of this year 250,000 more tourists visited the country than in the corresponding period in 2010, an increase of 15%.