High prices and poor transport infrastructure have left Ireland lagging behind the majority of its EU competitors for travel and tourism, writes Caroline Madden
The World Economic Forum's first travel and tourism competitiveness report ranked the Republic 27th out of 124 countries.
However Ireland was outperformed by 15 other EU member states.
The report measured the factors and policies that make a travel and tourism industry attractive for development, using "pillars" of competitiveness such as environmental regulation, infrastructure and natural resources.
Price competitiveness was identified as Ireland's Achilles heel, with the report ranking the State as 116th out of 124 countries for fuel price competitiveness, and 113th in relation to purchasing power parity.
The State's transport network was also identified as a weak area, with road, rail and port infrastructure dragging down Ireland's competitiveness from a travel and tourism perspective.
"The difficulty that Ireland has in terms of price competitiveness is that we are a high indirect tax country [SUCH AS VAT], with low direct taxes," said Brian Maher of Fáilte Ireland.
"This works against a lot of our visitors who come from economies where the reverse is true," he said.
"The value hasn't declined any further over the last two to three years, so we have arrested the decline [ in price competitiveness]," he said.
"Another factor that influences our value-for-money perception is that it's very heavily dependent on exchanges rates," he said, citing the weak dollar as an example.
Despite marketing itself as one of the most welcoming nations in the world, 16 other countries were perceived to have a better attitude towards tourists than Ireland.
The Government's efforts to reduce health risks from pandemics were also found to be lacking, leaving Ireland all the way down in 80th position on this count.
However, Ireland's travel sector fared well in areas such as its regulatory framework, health and hygiene and tourism infrastructure.
Fáilte Ireland recently launched a seven-year plan for tourism investment, focusing on filling "tourism gaps" by enhancing the environment, developing activities, creating new festivals and so on.
