Dr. Tom Healy:

Particular sectors are very vulnerable, especially food and beverages and pharmaceuticals, but also other enterprises affected in their supply chains. While we know a certain amount about it, a forensic study needs to be done at sectoral enterprise level to identify the enterprises most at risk either through import linkages or export exposure.

In other words, the analysis needs to move down to a more micro level and it must also involve local expertise. Local employers and trade unions representatives often have excellent insight into and knowledge of the way companies operate at local level. The reason this is urgent and requires that scale of co-operation and input is that when redundancies are threatened, it is almost too late and we are then dealing with a liquidation situation. There is a role here for State agencies, perhaps not unlike the role of the Industrial Credit Corporation when it existed to anticipate trouble and to get out early and identify problems. It may not be possible to avoid closure in some cases but we can then prepare and make the necessary adaptations and training efforts. It might also be possible in some cases to keep companies open for a while with the agreement of all concerned. That approach was used in Germany successfully during the intiial period of the recession in 2009. It involved co-operation in terms of shorter hours but also government subsidies, in effect, to keep the firm open. That proved to be cheaper than having an increase in the number on the live register.