Seán Kenny (Dublin North East, Labour)
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Question 254: To ask the Minister for Transport if he will report on his recent visit to India for St. Patrick's Day; the number of persons he met during the visit; the number of officials who accompanied him on the visit and the cost of the visit to date. [5921/11]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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India is the second fastest-growing major economy in the world. It has been growing at over 6% for the past 15 years and offers a wide range of opportunities for Irish interests, particularly in relation to trade, industry, education and tourism. If the Irish economy is to return to sustainable annual growth, we need to successfully engage with the BRIC economies. As such, the expansion of Irish firms into the Indian marketplace, as well as attracting foreign direct investment from India will play a key role in our economic recovery. Therefore, the purpose of my trip was to increase awareness of Ireland generally in India, to help promote Irish interests there, and to encourage investment and tourism from India to Ireland as well as educational co-operation.

In this regard, I departed from the 15th of March 2011 and returned on the 21st of March 2011. From my arrival in New Dehli on the 16th of March, to my departure on the 20th of March, there was a full schedule from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. During the course of my visit I met with a wide range of individuals and groups. These included Indian central and state governmental ministers and officials including the Minister for Civil Aviation, Shri Vayalar Ravi, the Secretary for Civil Aviation Dr. Zaidi, and Joint Secretary for Civil Aviation Prashant Sukul and the Minister for Science and Technology, Ashwani Kumar. I also met with Ministers from the Governments of the states of Goa, West Bengal and Maharastra.

I met with a number of Irish businesses operating in India and seeking to attract investment from India to Ireland. In this regard I met with a number of IDA Ireland and Enterprise Ireland clients, with a number of aviation interests, visited Dell's Indian headquarters as well as witnessing the signature of a Memorandum of Understanding between Keenan Technologies, an Irish company, and Keventer Agro, an Indian company.

In addition, I held meetings in New Delhi, Kolkata and Mumbai with Indian tourist and education agents in order to promote Ireland's attractions as a destination for Indian tourists, as well as a location for learning. Finally, I also attended the Irish cricket team's match with the Netherlands as a guest of Cricket Ireland and met with the team afterwards to congratulate them on their success at the Cricket World Cup in defeating England and the Netherlands. I also met with Sister Cyril Mooney of the Loretto Rainbow School in Kolkata - a noted Irish educationalist who has been a foremost innovator in Indian education since the 1950s.

I also carried out a number of interviews and briefings with the Indian media. I also met with IDA Ireland, Enterprise Ireland and Tourism Ireland representatives working on the ground in India, as well as the Honorary Consuls in Kolkata and Mumbai. On my return from India, I had the full details and costs of the trip published on the Departmental website. These details can be accessed from http://www.transport.ie/pressRelease.aspx?Id=300 . Furthermore during the course of my trip, there were regular updates on the Departmental website as to my activities on this trip including details of my itinerary.

On the trip I was accompanied by my private secretary. The total cost of the trip (for both myself and my private secretary) to my department including flights to India, and internal flights within India, overnight accommodation, gifts for dignitaries amongst other costs was €9,156.31. A full breakdown of these costs can be found on my Department's website. Approximately half those costs relate to me and half to my private secretary. I was also accompanied on part of my visit by Declan Collier, CEO of the Dublin Aviation Authority. It should be noted however, that his costs were not borne by my Department.

With regard to the number of people I met on the trip, it is not possible to state this definitively given the number of events that I attended. However, it was in excess of 100 people. Furthermore, I addressed over 1,000 people at evening events in New Delhi, Kolkata and Mumbai. I would like to place on record my appreciation of the work being done by the Irish Embassy in India, as well as the various Irish State agencies operating there.