More than £40 billion (€50.78 billion) will be spent on the new National Development Plan, to alleviate poverty and develop the Republic's infrastructure to keep the economy going forward.

Speaking at the opening of a £20 million plant expansion at Showerings, the Clonmel-based cider and drinks company, the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, warned that even though the Republic had had six years of growth, it did not mean that the Government could sit back.

"It could all go back again," he said. "The success of the economy has been based on people working together and partnership. The other way, the adversarial way, is a way of the past."

Mr Ahern said that in a competitive global economy, companies, just like countries, face a tough battle to build competitive advantage and to open up new opportunities for the future. " Winning that battle demands investment - often on a huge scale - and the investment must be in people as well as in systems."

Showerings' new facilities include a £10 million bottling line, a new 75-unit tank farm with a storage capacity of 16.5 million litres, fully automated processing facilities and a new 75,000 square foot warehouse.

Mr Ahern said that of all the countries in the European Union, Ireland is the only one with an expanding manufacturing sector, and people were investing with confidence in the future of the country.

Showerings, a member of the Cantrell & Cochrane Group and employing around 450 people, produces the country's leading cider brand, Bulmers, which commands 89 per cent of the Irish on-trade market.

Showerings' managing director Mr Brendan McGuinness said that cider sales have doubled to over 55 million litres over the last five years as a result of substantial investment in product development and marketing, and this has had a very beneficial effect in terms of stability of jobs in the industry.

The company, which purchases the entire cull apple harvest in the Republic of Ireland, has entered into 15-year contracts with local farmers to meet increasing demand.

Mr McGuinness said that the programme, which will see the development of a further 200 acres of orchards, was helping to stimulate fruit farming in Ireland and provided a viable alternative farm enterprise.

Showerings, which has a turnover of £100 million, has been in Clonmel for 62 years and employs 400 people in the town.