As the prospect of US tariffs and tit-for-tat trade sanctions between Brussels and Washington inches closer, two reports on Wednesday illustrated Ireland’s vulnerability to such a break in transatlantic trade.
First up Enterprise Ireland published its latest full-year results, indicating employment at companies supported by the agency rose to a record 234,454 last year, amounting to a net increase of 6,212. Enterprise Ireland’s mandate is to help domestic firms “to expand in international markets and to explore new exporting opportunities”.
The agency’s latest figures came as Galway-headquartered medtech company Aerogen, an Enterprise Ireland client company, announced a €300 million expansion plan which will create 725 jobs over the next 10 years. The group is one of the world’s leading manufacturers of respiratory nebulisers, and has been on a double-digit growth path for the last 10 years.
The Enterprise Ireland and Aerogen announcements came ahead of the latest trade numbers from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) which indicated that Irish goods exports eclipsed €20 billion for the third consecutive month in November on the back of a strong rebound in pharma exports last year. Overall the value of Irish goods exports for the first 11 months of 2024 grew by €25 billion or 14 per cent to €207.7 billion.
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Incoming US president Donald Trump says he will use tariffs, or at least the threat of tariffs, to improve the US trade balance and boost domestic manufacturing. If the MAGA firebrand even partially carries out his threat to impose tariffs of 10-20 per cent on all goods coming into the US from Europe and elsewhere and up to 60 per cent on those coming from China, global trade could be seriously disrupted.
Irish goods exports to the US in 2023 were valued at €54 billion, reflecting Ireland’s outsized exposure to a potential tariff war between the EU and the US.
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