A round-up of today's other stories in brief.

ESRI director appointed to Scotland post

ESRI director Prof Frances Ruane has been appointed by Scotland's first minister, Alex Salmond, to its newly-formed Council of Economic Advisers.

The council is expected to meet quarterly and to advise Mr Salmond on improving Scotland's economic growth rate. Dr Ruane has been appointed for a two-year term and will not receive a fee for her role.

Dr Ruane, who joined the ESRI last December, said the focus would be on improving Scotland's economic growth rate, which has lagged that of the UK.

Scotland's GDP is growing at about 1.8 per cent annually, compared with 2.3 per cent for the UK as a whole. This has impacted the country's population, which is declining.

Mr Salmond heads the Scottish National Party, which recently won power for the first time.

Dr Ruane said she was approached in the past fortnight. "He [ Mr Salmond] knew the work of the ESRI," she said. "He knows a lot about Ireland and is using us as a reference point for Scotland along with Norway."

BoI to provide €300m road fund

Bank of Ireland will provide the €300 million funding for the M7/M8 motorway project at Portlaoise for which NTR-backed Celtic Roads has won the contract.

Bank of Ireland's global project finance arm said yesterday that the bank had been named as mandated lead arranger to the project.

The development is part of the Dublin-Cork/ Limerick roads. It is due to be finished in 2010 and will operate as a toll road.

Call for more exports to Japan

Irish exports to Japan have the potential to reach 12 per cent of our total international trade according to Enterprise Ireland.

Despite it being the second largest market in the world in 2006, Irish exports to Japan were worth €2 billion or just 2.3 per cent of total exports. At 100 million, indigenous exports to Japan do not even account for 1 per cent of exports by Irish-owned firms.

Speaking at a conference in Dublin yesterday, Enterprise Ireland chief executive Frank Ryan said the accepted figure as a percentage of trade worldwide is 12 per cent.

BIAM loses two more executives

Bank of Ireland Asset Management (BIAM) has lost another two executives with the departure of Paul Boyne and Jamie Wood at the end of this month, it announced yesterday.

The departure of Mr Boyne comes just under a year after he was named managing director of global equities at BIAM, one of three managing directors appointed to run the investment management operation following the retirement of the bank's chief investment officer, Chris Reilly.

Chris Johns, another managing director and global head of equities and research, will take over as product head on an interim basis.

Visits to Dublin elderly urged

Businesses in Dublin city centre have been urged by an older persons' support group to encourage their staff to visit elderly people living in the area.

The Friends of the Elderly charity is aiming its appeal at large companies in areas such as the International Financial Services Centre.

Further details from  www.friendsoftheelderly.ie

'Free energy' display by Steorn

Irish technology firm Steorn says it will publicly demonstrate a real-life application of its "free energy" technology,

The demonstration of the Orbo technology will take place at the Kinetica Museum in London today and will run until July 13th.