An extra 90,000 tourists visited the State during the month of the Ryder Cup, according to the CSO's latest overseas travel statistics.
The CSO figures show that there were a total of 738,400 overseas visitors in September. This is an increase of 14 per cent on the corresponding month in 2005. The number of visitors from North America alone increased by over 19 per cent (19,400) on September 2005.
Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism, John O'Donoghue, welcomed the increase. "I am delighted that September, the month of the Ryder Cup, has seen an extra 90,000 visitors to Ireland," he said.
"They may not have all visited the Ryder Cup but I have no doubt whatsoever that we received a big boost from the publicity leading up to the successful staging of the event."
Mr O'Donoghue congratulated Fáilte Ireland and Tourism Ireland for a "great job" and added that the figures were "strong evidence that the hard work, which went into securing and promoting the Ryder Cup, had an effect in September" and "the real effect has yet to come."
Overall, in the year to September, the CSO reported that the number of visitors to the State from overseas was up by 11.2 per cent on the same period last year.