General Industry News

Irish consumer sentiment reached its lowest level since February

Business Post – 23.12.2021

Irish consumer sentiment reached its lowest level since February in December, due to concerns over the spread of Covid-19 as well as fears over the rising cost of living. KBC Bank’s consumer sentiment index showed “a clear and material deterioration” in the mood of Irish consumers of late but “not a complete collapse in confidence”, Austin Hughes, the bank’s chief economist, said. “The sense that the pandemic and price pressures may prove more persistent and problematic than previously thought – and the ghosts of previous spikes in both – mean the December sentiment index speaks of seasonal fear rather than seasonal cheer,” he said.

Passenger numbers at Dublin airport up 14% last year

RTE - 12.01.2021

Passenger numbers at Dublin Airport increased 14% to 8.46 million last year, when compared with 2020. Traffic figures released by the airport reveal that passenger numbers for 2021 were down 74% when compared to numbers in 2019, as Covid-19 continued to impact the aviation sector across the world. Two thirds of all passengers who travelled through Dublin Airport last year did so in the months of August, September, October and November - which equates to 5.6 million passengers. In total, 8.3 million passengers either started or ended their journey through Dublin Airport, while 155,000 of the overall number used the airport as a transfer hub last year. When compared to 2020 figures, short-haul traffic increased by 17% to 7.5 million, while long-haul passenger numbers decreased by 1% to almost one million. However, the figures show this is a drop of 83% when compared with 2019 passenger numbers for long haul pre-Covid-19 and 73% for short haul.