Claire Kerrane (Roscommon-Galway, Sinn Fein)
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180. To ask the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment the number of visits made by the IDA to County Roscommon and each location visited in 2020, 2021, and to date in 2022. [39050/22]

Claire Kerrane (Roscommon-Galway, Sinn Fein)
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181. To ask the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment the number of visits made by the IDA to County Galway and each location visited in 2020, 2021, and to date in 2022. [39051/22]

Claire Kerrane (Roscommon-Galway, Sinn Fein)
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183. To ask the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment the number of visits to a site (details supplied) by the IDA; the level of interest in same site; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [39053/22]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 180, 181 and 183 together.

2021 was a record-breaking year for Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) employment, with total employment in IDA client companies now standing at 275,384, up over 29,000 on 2020. Growth in the regions was particularly buoyant with 53%, that is 133 projects of the 249 investments won going to regional locations and employment growth was recorded in every region of the country.

Galway and Roscommon, along with Mayo, make up IDA's West Region, which showed 6% growth on the previous year. There are 120 IDA client companies employing 29,419 people directly in this region.

The strong growth in regional investment throughout 2021 and to date in 2022 is supported by IDA Ireland’s Regionl Property Programme. A robust property and infrastructure ecosystem can be the key differentiator in winning FDI projects.

IDA Ireland continues to engage with new companies on promoting Ireland as a location for their business utilising virtual site visits as well as physically visiting the county. Site visit details are recorded on a county basis, and I am advised that the verified figures for Q2 will be available next month. The numbers of site visits to both Galway and Roscommon for 2020, 2021 and to Q1 2022 are shown in the table below:

Ballinasloe is marketed as part of the West Region. This provides scale and scope, which gives confidence to the investor that they will be able to establish themselves outside of a main city area and manage to secure talent and services to make their business work. IDA markets the West Region to the Life Sciences, Technology and Global Business Services sectors.

IDA continues to market the available lands on the IDA business and technology park in Ballinasloe to potential investors, including the advanced planning permission for an Advanced Technology Unit on these lands.