London-based research and publishing company Lafferty Group is to create 40 jobs in Co Mayo over the next three years

The group is locating key educational and publishing activities for the global banking industry in Westport, backed by IDA Ireland.

The move will see the research and content division of the International Academy of Retail Banking (IARB) locate in the Mayo town.

A new element to the Lafferty Group, IARB provides professional education programmes and examinations for the retail banking sector, and also functions as an international professional body for retail bankers.

“Specialist retail banking education is not provided anywhere in the world – despite the fact that retail banking is the main source of bank profits,” said group chairman Michael Lafferty.

“The IARB has been created in the belief that retail banking should be a profession, like accountancy and law and offers similar professional education programmes and examinations. The guiding philosophy of the IARB is that banks should get away from pushing products at customers and instead focus on the overall customer relationship.”

The academy already has clients in more than 20 countries around the world. Its faculty consists of current and former retail bankers, card and payments executives, and academics from across the globe.

The academy offers a mixture of open courses and classroom tuition within banks.

“This announcement by the Lafferty Group is great news for Mayo and for the Western region,” Taoiseach Enda Kenny said. “The region offers excellent opportunities to companies locating here. Our talented and flexible workforce, which is of particular interest to service providers, is one of the many strengths that makes Ireland’s offering unique.”

Lafferty Group was set up more than 30 years ago by Michael Lafferty, a Roscommon native.