Ireland: Turning green into Gold

摘要

The background to any discussion of Ireland is shaped by three sets of issues: 1. the great famine of the 1840s, which created the first waves of immigration to the US and Australia, 2. the rule of Ireland by an occupying invader (the English until 1921), and 3. the Irish Republic's economy after World War II, which, on the one hand, caused the most recent wave of emigration from Ireland and, on the other hand, brought about the country's first effective steps toward an industrial-development policy. In 1969, the Investment and Development Agency (IDA Ireland) was formed to attract multinational companies and the jobs they could bring to Ireland. The IDA was the first of a series of government-supported entities that have helped Ireland to achieve remarkable progress. The Science Foundation Ireland, or SFI, as everyone refers to it, was founded in 2000 to help guide Ireland into a new era of industrial development and shows every sign of understanding what has gone before it and the challenges ahead.