Jennifer Murnane O'Connor (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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70. To ask the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment if he will report on the South-East Regional Enterprise Plan. [43790/21]

Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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Regional enterprise development and sustainable local job creation is a key policy priority of mine and this Government.

My Department is currently overseeing the development of nine new Regional Enterprise Plans to 2024.

These are ‘bottom-up’ plans, developed by regional stakeholders which will identify growth opportunities, recognise vulnerabilities, and enable job creation across the regions including in the South-East region through collaborative regional actions.

The new South-East Plan to 2024 which covers Carlow, Kilkenny, Waterford and Wexford will build on the core activities of the IDA, Enterprise Ireland and the LEOs and the wider range of State Bodies involved in supporting enterprise development in the region.

I have the pleasure of leading the delivery of the new Plan in the South-East and I have engaged directly with the South-East Regional Steering Committee made up of regional stakeholders and chaired by Patsy Carney, Director of Kinetic Labs, throughout 2021.

The regional stakeholders in the South-East region are currently working to finalise focused Strategic Objectives for their region, and actions to deliver on these objectives and intend to sign off on the new South-East Plan in the coming weeks.

Once this has been done, it is my Department's intention to publish all these new Plans including for the South-East region, in quarter 4 this year.

Finally, my Department through Enterprise Ireland has made available €0.5 million in Feasibility Funding with grants of up to €50,000 on a 50% match fund basis through the Regional Enterprise Transition Scheme which can be leveraged to develop nascent initiatives emerging from the Regional Enterprise Plans. A closing date of October 1^st2021 applies to this funding.