Mr. Joe Hackett:

The Farmleigh Fellowship is a good example of network members taking it upon themselves to go away from the forum and take forward ideas. The people from Asia and, in particular, Singapore, who were at Farmleigh in 2009 went back to Singapore and identified a gap in expertise at a business level in Asia. They established a one-year Asian graduate business studies programme between Nanyang Technological University, Singapore and UCC. Up to 25 graduates a year now carry out a period of study in UCC and complete their study in Singapore. During that time, they are placed with companies in Asia, predominantly around Singapore. In most cases, but not exclusively, they are Irish companies doing business out there. It is working effectively and is a good example of network members bringing an idea through to completion with emigrant support programme funding. We have given them funding over the past three years.

The point about private equity is very well made. One of the topics for priority discussion this year is financial services and supporting the SME sector, and something along the lines that Senator Walsh described would certainly be discussed. After the last forum, there were various private sector initiatives to increase credit guarantees or access to credit for SMEs. They have not come to fruition yet. The Government is supportive of them. The Senator's idea of taking private equity investment in property and direct it more towards SMEs is one that will get considerable traction in October.