Government agencies should conduct an annual audit and review of Ireland's international competitiveness as part of a strategy to deal with European economic and monetary union, according to Mr Seamus Bannon, planning manager with the Irish Trade Board.

The agencies should then target those companies found to be most at risk, Mr Bannon told the Statistical and Social Inquiry Society of Ireland.

Mr Bannon said that EMU would probably occur without sterling participating and that small, indigenous, low profit, labour intensive firms who are essentially prices takers in the sterling markets, would be most at risk. The clothing industry was a case in point, he said.