REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT A BUSINESS LUNCH HOSTED BY ENTERPRISE IRELAND, PORTLAND, OREGON
REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT A BUSINESS LUNCH HOSTED BY ENTERPRISE IRELAND, PORTLAND, OREGON SATURDAY 13 DECEMBER 2008
Thank you for that warm and generous welcome. Martin and I are delighted to be here today to renew and strengthen the ties between the city of Portland, the State of Oregon and Ireland.
Today’s lunch gives us an opportunity to celebrate the long tradition of business relations between the US and Ireland, and to demonstrate the breadth of Irish people and Irish companies doing business here, across a wide range of sectors.
I would like to express our thanks to Gerard and Lucille McAleese and Enterprise Ireland for hosting this event. Ireland has had a long affiliation with the US through a history of emigration, travel, culture, peace-making and, more recently, business development. The United States has provided a new homeland for literally millions of our people going back many generations. Woven into their stories and the great tapestry of the United States is the spirit of Ireland and Irish DNA. It means that when we meet in this generation we do not meet as strangers but as inheritors of bonds of kinship, clan and cultural compatibility and mutual empathy that makes it easy for us to do business together.
Irish America, that enormous parish inside our global Irish family, played a huge role not just in the building up the United States but also Ireland through the hard-earned dollars sent back to a poor Ireland over the years and through the investment in peace in Northern Ireland. Through these things we see the tenacity and fidelity of the emigrant, that remarkable man or woman who has two hearts one for the land and home left behind, the other for his or her adopted home. Today, a new and revitalised Ireland is host to many American investors who have played a significant role in the transformation of Ireland from poverty to prosperity.
The 450 US companies which operate out of Ireland and which have invested over fifty-five billion dollars in Ireland did not do so with shamrocks or sentiment in their eyes. They came because we offered a great business environment in which our natural cultural compatibility may have played a role alongside our membership of the EU and access to markets of half a billion people, the fact that we are the only English speaking member of the Eurozone, low rates of corporate tax, our educated and flexible young workforce and our short lines of communication. From their investment there grew a new generation of indigenous Irish entrepreneurs, many of whom have worked with the US companies in Ireland, on staff or as suppliers and now some of them are in their turn investing here in the United States. In fact Irish investors here employ almost as many people in the US as US investors employ in Ireland. So the story of US investment in Ireland is a fascinating chapter of synergies released by very effective partnerships.
Today, from virtually a standing start, Irish companies are estimated to employ over 80,000 people in the U.S and with investments of some US$33 billion, Ireland is now the 10th largest investor here. Over 190 Irish companies have 1,250 plus offices throughout the US. In this year so far, Irish companies opened 35 new offices in the Americas.
In spite of current economic volatility, Irish companies have sealed new partnerships with US-based corporate giants that range from sales contracts to acquisitions. For example, in the last three months alone, Irish telecom companies launched deals worth more than $23 million with leading US mobile phone carriers.
There are countless other Irish people based in the US who have shown similar drive and entrepreneurial passion and have started their own thriving companies. Many of you here today have followed this path. Not only do you strengthen the local Oregon economy but through your work here you are all ambassadors who promote the image of Ireland and its people as a place of innovation, with a hardworking workforce and a growing cohort of highly motivated entrepreneurs.
Ireland has arrived at a point in our economic development when the future performance of indigenous industry will be of central importance to tomorrow’s economic growth. The challenge is to ensure Ireland’s internationally trading firms in manufacturing and services are key drivers of growth. To compete and grow in today’s hugely difficult global economy, Irish companies need to be innovative and competitive. They need to exhibit sound leadership at home and great ease and fluency in international markets.
The focus of the development agencies, such as Enterprise Ireland, is to assist firms to innovate and internationalise in order to ensure long-term survival and growth. Like so many other economies, we have caught the economic chill that has spread like a virus around the world. But transcending adversity is deep in our DNA. It is deep in the DNA of the United States too. Our peoples have faced difficult times before and now we face ours. We will be tested but, like so many obstacles we face in life, they are much more easily overcome in good company and with the help of good friends. That is what we are to one another and we each have a burning ambition to bring real opportunity to our people. Hopefully the next chapter in the remarkable relationship between the US and Ireland will see us doing just that, securing for our citizens the future of shared and sustained prosperity they long for.
Thank you.