The Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism last night appeared to rule out any immediate additional spend on marketing in the US for this year, despite calls to capture a larger share of that market for the remainder of the season. It was already peak season, and it was "a tight budgetary situation", Mr O'Donoghue said in Killarney.
Most of the marketing money for 2002 had already been spent, in accordance with a decision taken by Tourism Ireland. "Tourism Ireland took a decision to front-load its marketing spend, that is to spend it early in the year," the Minister said.
About €27 million had been spent on marketing generally this year. This money was supplemented by niche market, regional marketing and special initiatives. Peak season had arrived by this stage. "To go off now and have a large spend on the US even if we did have the money, which we don't, could not yield the results," Mr O'Donoghue said.
He was conscious of the calls for immediate additional funding to capture the US market this year. Tourism Ireland would have to "set out very clearly what it wants the money for and they will have to set out a clear order of priorities", he said.
It was his intention in the future to have a greater concentration of efforts on the continental European market. "I see great capacity for growth in that market," he said. The growth target for tourism numbers from abroad over the next few years would be 5 per cent.