xports remain the primary
engine for Ireland's robust growth, the economy is also benefiting
from a rise in consumer spending and recovery in both construction and
business investment. Since the 1980s, inflation has fallen sharply and
chronic trade deficits have been transformed into annual surpluses.
Unemployment remains a serious problem, however, and job creation is
the main focus of government policy. To ease unemployment, Dublin
aggressively courts foreign investors and recently created a new
industrial development agency to aid small indigenous firms.

GDP: purchasing power parity - $59.9 billion (1996 est.)

GDP - real growth rate: 7% (1996 est.)

GDP - per capita: purchasing power parity - $16,800 (1996 est.)

GDP - composition by sector:
agriculture: 8.9%
industry: 38.6%
services: 52.5% (1994)

Inflation rate - consumer price index: 1.8% (1996 est.)

Labor force:
total: 1.474 million (1996 est.)
by occupation: services 62.3%, manufacturing and construction 26.0%,
agriculture, forestry, and fishing 10.6%, utilities 1.1% (1996 est.)

Unemployment rate: 11.9% (April 1996)

Budget:
revenues : $22.6 billion
expenditures: $23.6 billion, including capital expenditures of $4.3
billion (1995)

Industries: food products, brewing, textiles, clothing, chemicals,
pharmaceuticals, machinery, transportation equipment, glass and
crystal

Industrial production growth rate: 8.9% (1995 est.)

Electricity - capacity: 3.62 million kW (1994)

Electricity - production: 17.9 billion kWh (1995)

Electricity - consumption per capita: 4,343 kWh (1995 est.)

Agriculture - products: turnips, barley, potatoes, sugar beets, wheat;
meat and dairy products

Exports:
total value: $43.4 billion (f.o.b., 1995)
commodities: chemicals, data processing equipment, industrial
machinery, live animals, animal products
partners: EU 70% (UK 26%, Germany 14%, France 9%), US 6%

Imports:
total value: $32.7 billion (c.i.f., 1995)
commodities : food, animal feed, data processing equipment, petroleum
and petroleum products, machinery, textiles, clothing
partners: EU 58% (UK 37%, Germany 7%, France 4%), US 17%

Debt - external: $17.5 billion (1995)

Economic aid:
donor: ODA, $81 million (1993)

Currency: 1 Irish pound (LIr) = 100 pence

Exchange rates: Irish pounds (LIr) per US$1 - 0.6123 (January 1997),
0.6248 (1996), 0.6235 (1995), 0.6676 (1994), 0.6816 (1993), 0.5864
(1992)

Fiscal year: calendar year

@Ireland:Communica