New body to market Cork region for business and tourism

A new body is being set up to market the Cork region abroad for business and tourism which will combine the efforts of the city and county councils along with other major bodies.

Cork INC (Innovated, Networked, Connected) will be spearheaded by the councils and will include a number of organisations such as Fáilte Ireland, Cork Airport, University College Cork, Cork Institute of Technology, Cork Chamber of Commerce, the Port of Cork, Enterprise Ireland, and IDA Ireland.

Acting county manager Declan Daly said the decision to set up Cork INC was taken because of increased competition from areas in Europe which had already combined to market their respective regions.

Mr Daly said other organisations such as Cork Business Association and the Irish Hotels Federation would be added to the list of participants as Cork INC expanded and the body would take on expert PR and marketing people.

There was widespread support for the move at Cork County Council’s meeting yesterday. However, Cllr Dermot Sheehan (FG) said he was concerned Cork INC was made up mainly of city-based organisations and it would be to the detriment of places like West Cork.

Cllr Barbara Murray (FG), heavily involved in tourism initiatives in East Cork, said all tourist-related bodies in the region should be represented on it.

However, their party colleagues Gerard Murphy (county development board chair) and Derry Canty (chair of the council’s tourism special purposes committee) said if the city and county didn’t combine on promotions they could not compete with Dublin.

Outgoing city manager Tim Lucey described Cork INC as one of the most significant developments in the promotion of the Cork region in decades: “This proposal strongly reflects the unified commitment of Cork city and county councils to jointly achieve the most for the region in terms of tourism, visitors, investment, marketing and economic development.”