Aisling Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail)
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52. To ask the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment the number of jobs in Meath currently supported by Enterprise Ireland and by the IDA; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [33034/25]

Alan Dillon (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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The Government is firmly committed to driving balanced regional development as a cornerstone of its enterprise policy. Under the “Delivering for Ireland, Leading Globally” Strategy 2025–2029, Enterprise Ireland aims to grow employment in client companies to 275,000, with a strong emphasis on regional job creation and scaling indigenous businesses across all counties.The employment performance of Enterprise Ireland (EI) clients in County Meath over the past five years has been very encouraging. Notwithstanding the effects of Covid -19 and other recent geopolitical events, there was a 15% increase in net jobs over that period.In 2024, there were 979 jobs created by 207 EI clients in County Meath with a net increase of 672 jobs over the year. The total number of EI supported jobs in 2024 was 9,034. This is a net increase of 8% in employment over 2023, a very strong performance by Irish owned enterprises in the county.

County Meath has a strong focus on the food sector and food businesses, with the Boyne Valley Food Innovation District, Meath Enterprise Centre and the local County Council strong promoters and supporters of this eco-system within the county.

There are 16 IDA supported companies in Meath, employing 3,047 in total. The Mid- East Region comprises counties Kildare, Louth, Meath and Wicklow. There are 121 IDA client companies in the Mid-East Region, employing 20,470 people. The FDI performance in the region has been consistent over the past five years with employment among IDA clients increasing by 10%. The Mid-East has a significant ecosystem of well-established companies across Technology, Life Sciences, International Financial Services and Engineering & Industrial Technologies. It has also won significant investment in the Food and the Film sub-sectors. Key IDA client companies in the region include Intel, Takeda, PCI, Wuxi Biologics, Servier, Elavon, Merck, Becton Dickinson, Cargotec, Kaseya, Prometric, Noesis, ABB, Paypal and Vesta. Counties in the Mid-East also benefit hugely from the direct and indirect employment generated by IDA client companies located in Dublin.