IDA report shows how regional wins benefit everyone
The latest figures from IDA Ireland show that Ireland is still doing a good job of attracting investment from global companies. For the six months to June 2025, there have been 179 investments by foreign companies, an increase of 37% on the same period last year. Those investments are predicted to result in more than 10,000 jobs.
Not bad going. Those figures coincided with the publication of IDA Ireland’s annual report for 2024, which showed it had attracted 234 investments with associated future job creation of 13,500. According to the organisation, employment in IDA Ireland client companies reached 302,566, marking a third consecutive year at a level above 300,000. Employment in the regions outside Dublin reached a record high of 165,484.
It’s the regional part that I want to focus on. According to IDA Ireland, it supported 137 regional investments, achieving 143% of its target. Those investments consisted of new names, expansions, investments of scale, and transformation across manufacturing, RD&I (research, development and innovation) and business services.
IDA Ireland’s new strategy, Adapt Intelligently: A Strategy for Sustainable Growth and Innovation 2025-2029, “will seek to maintain the strategic strength of Dublin as an international FDI hub whilst striving to ensure balanced regional development across the country, via initiatives such as Next Generation Sites”. There are plans for three such “fully serviced sites in regional locations for investments of scale”.
Over the lifetime of the new strategy, IDA Ireland has set a target of 1,000 investments, with 550 allocated to the regions, with plans to upskill 40,000 people, deliver €7 billion in new RD&I projects and create 75,000 jobs.
As someone who lives in a regional location, I am very enthusiastic about the diversification of foreign direct investment across the country. Obviously, there are benefits to the regions in terms of employment and development, but this is also an approach that helps Dublin too. Over-concentration of investment and development in the nation’s capital merely leads to intensifying pressure on its infrastructure and resources while, simultaneously, taking potential funding, investment and prosperity away from the regions.
It is interesting to note that IDA Ireland highlights housing, energy, water supply and transportation infrastructure as key national priorities for the country to enhance its cost competitiveness and attractiveness for FDI.
All those issues are notable pressure points for the capital in particular and most politicians seem to be offering only piecemeal solutions to address them. Of course, part of the reason Dublin is struggling is because of past success in attracting FDI to the capital. The concentration of so much FDI activity in Dublin over the years has helped to create the very conditions IDA Ireland is now highlighting as key national priorities.
Spreading the wealth
Note the word ‘national’. You could be forgiven for wondering if it’s only when something starts to impact Dublin that it becomes ‘national’. For many years, the regions have had to deal with deficiencies in several of the key priorities highlighted by IDA Ireland. But for the most part, those deficiencies were not a result of the regions growing too fast or being too successful in attracting investment.
For example, the recent All-Ireland Strategic Rail Review Report suggested a potential rail link between Derry and Letterkenny (although it made no recommendation on a similar link between Letterkenny and Sligo) by 2050. Donegal does not have a rail service. It used to but the railway was closed down on 31 December 1959. If all goes to plan, Donegal will get trains again after a 91 year wait. If.
Looked at from a regional perspective, I believe that while setting a target of 55% of investments for the regions is laudable, it’s not sufficient. The only way to ease the stress and burden on Dublin and the distortionary effects it has on the national priorities for housing, energy, water supply and transport infrastructure, is to further diversify investments across the country.
In an ideal world, I believe that the figure for regional investments should be much higher. Off the top of my head, I would suggest as high as 70%. Dublin accounts for around a fifth of the country’s population, so why should it be the preferred destination for so much FDI? Given the historical bias of FDI towards Dublin, the target of 45% by 2029 still seems excessive.
Which just goes to show that while the IDA Ireland Annual Report calls for “balanced regional development across the country”, how we interpret balanced can be very different depending on where you live in the country.
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