10.45 am - By NEIL SANDERSON
A burning national ambition, recognised and promoted by governments, is the foundation of economic recovery in Ireland.
"The Irish spent so long not being satisfied with their lot that we want to continue to grow, we want to continue to develop, and that comes through in political action," says Sean Dorgan, chief executive of Ireland's Industrial Development Agency.
The IDA is an Irish government agency responsible for securing new foreign investment in the country's manufacturing and international service sectors.
"Irish governments aren't about running the country - they're about developing the country," said Mr Dorgan, who spoke at the Catching the Knowledge Wave conference in Auckland this morning.
From a country with 17 per cent unemployment in the mid 1980s, Ireland has transformed itself into a magnet for international investment, where unemployment is a mere 4 per cent and exports account for 90 per cent of GDP.
Mr Dorgan, said there is a deep-rooted national consensus in Ireland that accepts investment by multinational companies and drives economic growth.
He told the conference that in the late 1950s Ireland was in a crisis. A thousand people were leaving the country every week. Attempts to encourage international investment in the 1970s were only partially successful and unemployment in 1986 was 17 per cent.
Since the election of a new government in 1987, however, the country has enjoyed spectacular growth, thanks in part to Social Partnership Agreements. The agreements limited wage increases nationally and cut personal taxes.
The Irish Government also moved to encourage international investment through initiatives such as very low corporate taxes that attracted companies in the fields of information and communications technology, pharmaceuticals and healthcare, international services and e-business.
Mr Dorgan noted several examples of multinationals that had made major investments in the country.
Ireland is now the world's leading exporters of software, thanks in part to an Irish-based Microsoft service centre that employs 1100 people and supplies Europe, Africa and the Middle East.
Intel employs 4000 people in Ireland, and exports Pentium chips globally. Dell employs 5000 and serves customers throughout Europe, Africa and the Middle East.
Nine of the world's top 10 pharmaceutical companies and 10 of the world's top 15 medical products companies have substantial operations serving global markets from Ireland.
The country's real GDP growth rate rose from two per cent in 1991 to 11 per cent last year.
In 1997, the annual growth in jobs hit what Mr Dorgan described as a "phenomenal" peak of 10 per cent.
He did not believe that Ireland was at risk of losing the multinational companies it had worked so hard to attract.
"I don't accept that multinationals are footloose. When we capture it (international investment) we don't let it go easy. It's not that we can hold it if they want to go, but we make it so good that they couldn't possibly conceive of going, so long as they have a decent market to serve."
He said Ireland had lost very few multinational companies - and when companies did move their operations because of changing economic conditions, the government worked with them to replace the lost jobs with higher value activities.
He said incentives to attract business to Ireland were relatively small - "the icing on the cake" - but were "the price you pay to play the game".
He said creating an overall climate that supported and welcomed business was much more important.
Following substantial investment in tertiary education, Ireland was recognised in the IMD World Competitiveness Report as one of the test countries in the world for the quality of education meeting the needs of a competitive economy.
Over half of all secondary school graduates pursue tertiary education, which is free at the undergraduate level. Sixty per cent of tertiary students major in engineering, science or business studies.
"We have a great young workforce. It's absolutely fantastic for people of my generation, who grew up in the 50s and 60s to view the confidence in the kids and their ability, and their 'gung ho' attitude."
He said there was another national characteristic in Ireland which he believed was hugely important.
"It's creativity, it's agility, it's ability to move quickly, it's flexibility, it's responsiveness.
"We don't have fixed and settled ways of doing things, and we're probably not as systematic as most other peoples. But we're quick, and if we see an opportunity we'll move to it very quickly. If we see a problem, we'll find a solution quickly."
He said the "nimbleness" was partly a result of its small size - with approximately the same population as New Zealand.
"You can get decisions made quickly. You can get Government to move quickly."
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