SHAMROCKS AND HORSESHOES By: Garrett Harrison

Ireland ECONOMY  Their per capita GDP is $41,700  They have a 14.6% unemployment rate  5.5% of their population is below the poverty line.  Their GDP real growth rate is.7%  Their inflation rate is 1.3%  Their budget surplus or deficit is -8.5%

IRELAND INDUSTRIES  Pharmaceuticals  Chemicals  Computer hardware and software  Food products  Beverages and brewing  Medical devices

GDP COMPOSED BE SECTOR  Agriculture: 2%  Industry: 29%  Services: 69%

LABOR FORCE BY OCCUPATION  Agriculture: 5%  Industry: 19%  Services: 76%

 $113.6 billion  Machinery and equipment  Chemicals  Computers  Medical devices  Pharmaceuticals  Food products  Animal products EXPORTS Exports  UK 39.8%  US 13%  Germany 7.8%  Netherlands 5.8% Export Partners

 $63.1 billion  Data processing equipment  Any other machinery and equipment  Chemicals  Petroleum and other petroleum products  Textiles  clothing  UK 39.8%  US 13%  Germany 7.8%  Netherlands 5.8% IMPORTS Imports Import Partners

FOOD  Bacon and Cabbage  Nettle Soup  Colcannon  Irish Brown Bread  Champ  Leek and Potato Soup

LANGUAGES  English  Irish

CLOTHING  Kilt  Tunic Dress  Knee Stockings  Black Jackets

ETHNIC GROUPS  Irish 87.4%  Other white 7.5%  Asian 1.3%  Black 1.1%  Mixed 1.1%  Unspecified 1.6%

MUSIC

CLIMATE  There is cool summers  Ireland is consistently humid  Mild winters  There is an overcast most of the time

NATURAL RESOURCES  Peat  Copper  Lead  Zinc  Natural gas  Silver  Limestome

GEOGRAPHY  70,273 sq. km  Ireland is slightly larger than West Virginia  Coast Line: 1,448 km

CURRENT EVENT  The Bank of Ireland is striving to emerge from the wreckage of the country’s deep banking debt crisis, and on Monday posted a smaller underlying loss, but its road back to restoring profitability remains long. The bank was a among a group of six stricken lenders that needed enormous amounts of money from Irish taxpayers to keep them from immediate collapse when Ireland’s over-inflated property market burst horribly over five years ago. Compared with nationalized rivals Allied Irish Banks and Permanent TSB PLC, it shows the healthiest signs of being on mend.But, with Ireland’s economic recovery slower than expected, predicting when Ireland’s dysfunctional banking system has firmly turned the corner remains as difficult as ever to predict, analysts say.