New Potential Exporters Division Goes Live

The Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Richard Bruton TD, today announced that a new Potential Exporters Division in Enterprise Ireland has gone live, and launched a new programme of supports for exporters in order to get more indigenous companies trading in foreign markets.

Today’s announcement marks the delivery of a key Q1 measure under the Action Plan for Jobs 2012.

The new Potential Exporters Division will:

•identify more exporters and providing focussed targeted supports to these companies

•provide supports for 1800 companies in 2012,

•target 250 of these for intensive work on export initiatives

•achieve an increase of 60% in the number of companies which will receive the Going Global grant in 2012, compared with 2011.

The "Get Export Ready" programme of supports, aimed specifically at pre-export and early stage exporting companies, will provide the following new supports for exporting companies:

•Workshops, seminars and training across the country

•Mentoring and advocate support

•Access to market information

•A new website with “how to” guides, links to relevant information, self-assessment tools and templates

•A new helpdesk

•Access to advice from successful exporting companies

•Access to a range of Enterprise Ireland financial supports

Launching the initiatives today, Minister Bruton said: "If we are to see the jobs recovery we so badly need, we must create a powerful engine of indigenous enterprise. While exports continue to grow strongly, we must ensure that we achieve a substantial improvement in the export performance of Irish businesses. That is why, as part of the Action Plan for Jobs, we are overhauling the way Government supports companies who have potential to trade in foreign markets, creating a new Potential Exporters Division to focus on improving export performance, and implementing a range of new supports to help these companies as they seek to export more.

"Enterprise Ireland has committed to improving the export performance of the companies it supports by 22% from €13.9billion in 2010 to €17billion in 2015. I believe that with the proper supports, we can surpass this target. I am determined that with the continued implementation of the Action Plan for Jobs in 2012 and beyond, a new generation of exporters can drive our recovery and support the employment growth we are working so hard to achieve."

(CD/GK)