The evaluation of individual projects in the manufacturing and internationally traded services sectors for the purposes of determining eligibility for grant assistance is a day-to-day matter for the State development agencies, and is not a matter in which I have a direct function.
To specify a mandatory level of domestic purchases in order that a firm be eligible for grant assistance would be contrary to EC competition rules.
Expenditure by a company within the Irish economy is, however, of central importance in analysing the effectiveness of industrial development. The IDA determines the pattern of the expenditure in two ways:
—a cost/benefit analysis, including expenditure in the Irish economy, is undertaken at the project appraisal stage;