Labour shortages are spreading to the north-west and both services and manufacturing sectors are now being affected, a report by IBEC has found.
Almost two-thirds of companies in the region experienced recruitment problems in the past year and 42 per cent said the main reason was the shortage of applicants with the right experience.
While 48 per cent of companies said they did not recruit from abroad, they would now consider this as an option. The report was carried out jointly by IBEC West and North West because the shortage of labour "emerged as an increasingly important issue for companies" over the past year.
It analyses how companies are adapting recruitment procedures, such as trying to encourage more women to return to the workplace.
"It is clear from this research that the problem of labour supply has now spread to both services and manufacturing sector," IBEC regional director Mr Padraig O'Grady said.
He said Ireland still had one of the lowest rates of female participation in the labour market in the EU and he believed measures to increase those in work should be redirected from unemployment and long-term unemployment towards "a wider category of potential labour supply entrants".
Nine out of 10 companies in the north-west have some form of flexible working or family-friendly arrangements and one in five companies in the region is trying to recruit staff abroad.