A sustainable regional economic growth strategy for Ireland's Mid West : targets and policies

The Mid West is considerably underdeveloped relative to other Irish regions and international economies, largely due to the region’s low value added service sector and a leakage of highly skilled labour, including graduates and female labour, from the region. The objective of this research is to establish the factors that drive regional economic growth in terms of pursuing a long term growth model for the Mid West and determining the key government policies required in order to stimulate this. The theoretical and empirical findings of this research show that a confluence of various factors drives regional economic growth, including physical and human capital, an exporting service sector, labour supply, trade, innovation, technological progress, clusters of economic activity and entrepreneurship. This research investigates key economic performance data for the Mid West Region. Policy prescriptions for the Mid West, based on ex-ante literature and case studies of best practice, are presented. Specific emphasis is placed on the service sector and labour market dynamics, including female labour force participation, in recent years. The policy discussion illustrates that supportive and tailored regional development policies have the potential to drive a virtuous circle of regional economic growth in the Mid West. The findings show that the current regional growth model in Ireland is unbalanced, biased towards Dublin and the East, and is not sufficient in realising the full potential of the Mid West. The Irish government’s approach to regional development is largely aspirational as it lacks detailed policy targets for each of the regions.