The story of Ireland's trade with France over the past decade or so is a fairly accurate barometer for Ireland's economic performance over the same period. In 1987, the year that most people point to as the turning point in our economic fortunes, Ireland's total exports to France amounted to £994 million with imports coming in at £401 million giving us a positive trade balance of £593 million.
These figures sound pretty good. Exports of almost £1 billion and a trade surplus of more than half that. But they pale in significance when compared with the 1999 figures. During that year Ireland imported £1.438 billion worth of goods and services from France while trade in the opposite direction amounted to an enormous £4.417 billion. This gives us a trade surplus of £2.979 million - five times that of 1987. Ireland is definitely punching above its weight in the French market with only three other countries in the world operating higher surpluses than us.
Our importance as a supplier to France is relatively high as well given our size - Ireland is its 11th largest supplier. Given that Ireland is the EU's second smallest economy and that France has a network of former colonies with favourable trade agreements stretching around the globe this is a considerable achievement. From an Irish point of view France is our fourth largest customer behind Britain, the US and Germany.
Ireland is also important to France as a customer, both in relative and absolute terms. In terms of total value of French exports Ireland ranks 22nd among France's customer nations around the world. Looking at it in relative terms from Ireland's standpoint, France is our fifth largest supplier having moved ahead of Singapore over the past year.
In terms of the make-up of our exports to France the largest amount is accounted for by office machines and automatic data processing equipment - computers in everyday language - with £1.142 billion being sold to France over the past year. Next on the list is organic chemical products at £649 million, pharmaceutical products accounted for £319 million and dairy and poultry products accounted for £236 million. We can export food to the French after all!
In the other direction the largest single category of imports was telecommunications and sound equipment at £230 million, followed by computer equipment at £222 million, and organic chemical products at £81 million. Our growing penchant for a tipple of French wine is evidenced by the fact that our fourth largest category of imports from France is beverages at £59 million.
The French embassy to Ireland anticipates trade continuing to grow in the year ahead with Ireland's surplus also growing. This is attributed to the growth in specialist export-led industries based in Ireland such as computer software and the recovery in the French economy which will fuel its demand for imports. Estimates are for French exports to Ireland to top £1.6 billion in the year ahead with Irish exports to France growing to more than £4.7 billion.
