The Minister for Small Business, John Perry TD, recently launched a survey on ‘The Impacts of Community Owned Enterprise Centres in Ireland’ on behalf of the National Association of Community Enterprise Centres (NACEC) and Enterprise Ireland. The survey was launched during a visit to Enniscorthy Enterprise Centre.

Since the launch of the first Community Enterprise Centre scheme in 1989, €61.4 million has been approved by Enterprise Ireland for the development of CECs across the country. Also in January 2012, Enterprise Ireland introduced a €2m fund to support the appointment of 46 Business Development Managers to sustain and scale up tenants and employment numbers within the CECs.

The survey illustrates that 392 new businesses have commenced operations in the CECs since 2010. Also 9,300 jobs have been created by companies in CECs in the past decade. As of today, over 3700 jobs are in place in the Enterprise Ireland-funded CECs all over the country and 93% or 3460 of these are private sector jobs, which can often be critical to local services and employment creation.

The NACEC is the representative body of the 120 Community Enterprise Centres (CECs) all over the country that have been funded by Enterprise Ireland. NACEC acts as the focal point of support for centres and their Business Development Managers. CECs are leading lights for employment creation in their respective areas and are regarded as best practice models, not only in Ireland but across Europe, for dispersed job creation and local economic development.