Ireland achieves a Record 4 Billion Euro Trade Surplus
Irish Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Mr. Richard Bruton, TD, welcomes latest external trade figures
Minister Bruton welcomed the latest external merchandise trade statistics, which were released earlier this week. The preliminary €4.079 billion seasonally adjusted trade surplus in June is Ireland’s highest ever surplus.
The Minister said:
“I am delighted that the recent good news on the export front is continuing. It is indeed heartening to know that despite the turbulent international markets into which we are exporting our exports are continuing to perform to an extremely high level. I have said repeatedly that my priorities are to; get our costs down, get credit to good businesses and to support the innovation and R&D agenda. These trade figures encourage me further to pursue this agenda so that we can continue to support export-led growth and recovery”.
He was commenting on the figures, which show that the value of exports in June 2011, at €8.343 billion, was up 5.6% when compared with June 2010. For the first six months of the year the trade surplus stands at €21.9 billion compared with €21.2 billion in the first half of 2010 – an increase of 3.3% and despite the serious economic difficulties affecting the global economy.
The Minister also welcomed data released by EUROSTAT, the EU statistics body last week, which showed that Ireland had the third largest Trade surplus of the 27 Member States for the five months January – May 2011 (after Germany and the Netherlands).
The Minister also said “Exports to dynamic emerging economies and those of Asia show the benefits of helping exporters concentrate more on these markets”.
Ireland’s trade with Japan has improved in 2011, over the first five months of this year trade exports to Japan rose by 1% but the pace of growth is increasing with exports to Japan in June being 11% higher than the same month in 2010. Ireland’s main exports to Japan are chemicals, manufactured goods and food products.
END
From The Embassy of Ireland in Japan
