Ms Julie Sinnamon:

Our competitors vary from sector to sector and market to market. Dairy processing and within that, milk formula, is the biggest export sector to China. New Zealand is the key competitor for those products. For precision engineering and very sophisticated products it varies by country. Competition for our strong engineering companies might come from Germany. It really depends on the product.

One of the words that kept coming up when we were in China a few weeks ago was trust. The products China buys from Ireland, including milk formula, have not been without their local crises and scandals. China trusts Ireland as a source, on environmental grounds. We have some advantages in such markets and it is a matter of using them.

The United Kingdom is constantly in and out of our companies trying to get as much investment as it can from them. Therefore, for anybody supplying into the UK market, the UK is a competitor looking for that type of investment.

Most Irish start-ups begin with their community. Increasingly, on the technology start-up side cities are competing. When we looked for mobile entrepreneurs a few weeks ago those concerned came from every country. It was like a Eurovision list. We are competing against Berlin, the UK, and every key city in the world. Somebody setting up a technology company can choose to set it up here or in the US. We are constantly competing for start-up companies and in the market place against different players.

Much has been said about entrepreneurship tax in the past week. It is part of the competitive position. Last week a step was taken in the right direction but we still have a way to go, particularly against the UK, where there is a competitive situation. We take some comfort from the recognition that this is important and there has been a move in the right direction by bringing down the capital gains tax for entrepreneurs.

Senator Quinn wondered what I would ask for if I met a leprechaun with a crock of gold. The greatest issue facing all the companies we work with has to do with the skills base. They are constantly in a war for talent, both within Ireland and globally. The skills issue is probably the greatest constraint under which all these companies are operating. While we are happy to spend a lot of time in public fora talking about Irish companies, there is often not an awareness of the number of great companies within the Irish portfolio. Those companies want organisations like us, and public representatives, to talk about the successes within the Irish portfolio. That is how profiles are raised. Going back a few years, there was probably a greater resistance to announcing expansions and so on. Now, however, companies that never did so in the past increasingly want to raise their profile because they know they are competing against the best in the world for talent. I would certainly ask the leprechaun for help on the skills side as it is the main factor holding back the companies we deal with.