General Industry News

Ireland's competitiveness 'under threat', tourism body warns

Irish Times - 11.08.2022

One million people visited Ireland last month, as recovery across the tourism sector continued to gather pace. However, new figures from the Irish Tourism Industry Confederation (ITIC) show that visitor numbers were still down 11% in July compared to the same month in 2019 - before the pandemic. The data shows that so far this year, visitor numbers are down 24% when compared to the first seven months of 2019. The ITIC, which represents accommodation providers, attractions, tourism operators, restaurateurs and pubs, said Ireland’s competitiveness is "under threat", stating that input costs and prices are rising faster than the European average. Despite operational challenges and labour shortages, today’s data reveals strong demand during the month of July. Visitors from Continental Europe performed most strongly - down 7% on 2019, while the key North American market showed improvement with 268,000 visitors.

Unemployment rate falls to 21-year low of 4.2% in July – CSO

RTE – 04.08.2022

New and revised data from the Central Statistics Office today shows that the unemployment rate fell to a 21-year low of 4.2% in both May and July. Provisional data had shown the jobless rate hovering at the level it stood at before the Covid-19 pandemic before the May reading was revised down to 4.2% from 4.7% and June amended to 4.3% from 4.8% previously. Unemployment had stood at 5.8% in July of last year. The CSO said the seasonally adjusted number of people who were unemployed stood at 113,000 in July, compared with 113,900 in June.