Press Release
23 January 2003
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT FORUM MAKING A DIFFERENCE TO NI ECONOMY
Ian Pearson, MP, Northern Ireland Office Minister with responsibility for Enterprise, Trade and Investment today praised the work of the Economic Development Forum saying its work can make a real difference to the economy of Northern Ireland.
The Minister made his remarks as he welcomed members of the Economic Development Forum to their fourteenth meeting at the offices of the Centre for Competitiveness in Belfast.
He said: “It is important that we focus our attention on areas where, collectively, the EDF partnership can make a real difference.”
The primary role of the Forum is to provide advice to Ministers on matters affecting the development and future competitiveness of the Northern Ireland economy.
Top of the agenda today was discussion on how to move forward the process of strengthening the local economy with all sectors, public, private, community and voluntary working in partnership.
This process began on 20 June 2002, with the launch of the Forum’s first publication, Working Together for a Stronger Economy. The publication provides a clear and agreed statement of the priorities to be addressed if the NI economy is to be significantly strengthened during the period to the year 2010. It sets a high level framework of priorities, objectives, performance indicators, targets, supporting actions and key contributors.
The Minister said that Northern Ireland’s future prosperity is based on its ability to develop and thrive as a modern, innovative, and knowledge-driven economy.
He said: ”It is crucial that the education and training system provides an interdependent workforce of researchers, innovative thinkers, entrepreneurs, and highly skilled technicians and workers. But this can only be achieved if the universities, further education colleges, business community and Government are all working together towards clearly agreed aims and objectives.
“This heightened degree of co-ordination is really what EDF and the strategic priorities are all about and it is also one of the key objectives of ‘think | create | innovate: The Regional Innovation Strategy for Northern Ireland’ which I launched for consultation in November.”
At today’s meeting Members discussed the development of actions to be taken by key contributors to increase the likelihood of achieving the targets set by EDF. Members hope to publish this Action Plan within the next few months.
Mr Pearson emphasised the importance of all sectors being actively involved in developing the Action Plan.
He said: “The genuine partnership approach adopted by the Forum in developing the medium term strategic priorities will be the key to success in producing and implementing the Action Plan. There is no point in setting targets if we don’t then agree what steps each of us must take to help meet them. All sectors, public, private, community and voluntary have important and interconnected roles to play.”
At the meeting, Members also heard an update on the work of the Employability Taskforce, the Regional Transportation Strategy and the Regional Innovation Strategy and discussed progress in relation to a wide range of DETI-related activities.
NOTES FOR EDITORS
Further information about the Forum and access to Working Together for a Stronger Economy can be found at www.edfni.com
Additional information on the Centre for Competitiveness can be found at www.cforc.org