Innovative research commissioned by the Western Development Commission (WDC) and carried out by researchers at NUI Galway has highlighted the potential for a doubling of the workforce employed in the Creative Sector over the next 10 years. Additionally this could lead to up to €150 million in additional exports per annum from the sector – a key area of growth identified. The report is a follow up to the WDC’s much heralded Creative West report (PDF Download) published in February 2009, which in itself established the creative economy in the Western Region as being internationally significant with 4,775 businesses employing 11,000 people directly.

The follow up analysis entitled –“Creative Sector in The Western Region – Future Growth Trajectories” (PDF Download), was published this week by the WDC. Complied by a research team led by Dr. Patrick Collins of NUI Galway’s Centre for Innovation and Structural Change (CISC) the report maps out the future growth scenarios for an industrial sector that has been bucking international trends in terms of growth.

Countries that wish to increase their competitive advantage have turned to design as a mechanism to add value to the goods and services that their indigenous companies produce. Recognising that those companies that use design are more successful than those that do not, they invest significant time and effort in promoting and supporting companies to overcome the barriers to its effective use. Their goal is to increase the demand for design.

Increasing demand is only one side of the equation however; it is just as important that there should be a broad and deep supply of designers who can provide services to business to help them add value to their products and services. Without them, an economy can be starved of a key input that helps to differentiate the goods and services it produces.

A range of interrelated issues governs the supply of designers who provide services to business. The role of education is critical, as is the aspiration of the individual and ultimately the market for their services. But there are also a number of other more subtle influences such as the role of the industry support bodies, the nature of continuous professional development and the business empathy of designers themselves.

This report examines the strengths and weaknesses of the sector and makes recommendations about how to build on those strengths in order to stimulate one small but important part of the economy that can create added-value to the economy as a whole. Given the similar barriers faced by the sector in Northern Ireland and Ireland, it makes sense to adopt a cooperative approach to optimise the potential of the sector.

Aidan Gough
DIRECTOR, STRATEGY & POLICY
InterTradeIreland

Download study (PDF, 568k)