Cross-Border trade hit €12bn in 2022, conference hears

Cross-Border trade topped €12 billion in 2022, while it is poised to beat that total this year, a conference heard on Wednesday.

Trade between the Republic and Northern Ireland has grown strongly despite UK voters opting to leave the EU in 2016, according to Margaret Hearty, chief executive of InterTradeIreland.

“Cross-Border trade has grown every year since 2016,” she told a discussion on the Windsor Framework at this year’s A&L Goodbody Corporate Crime and Regulation Summit in Croke Park, Dublin.

“Trade is likely to have exceeded €12 billion in 2022 and to head upward from that target in 2023,” she said.

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The total was €6 billion in 2016 and had reached €7.7 billion by 2020, Ms Hearty said.

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Established under the Belfast Agreement, IntertradeIreland helps businesses across Ireland to sell their goods and services on both sides of the border.

Most of its clients are small- and medium-sized businesses, many of them taking their first step to “exporting” by selling across the Border, Ms Hearty said.

The Windsor Framework recently replaced the Northern Ireland Protocol and allows businesses in the North access to both the British and single European markets.

Speaking ahead of the session dealing with the framework, Michael Neil, partner in A&L Goodbody’s Belfast office, agreed that this dual access was attractive to investors.

He said the new structure did not create “frictionless” trade, but argued that businesses should not let “the search for perfection get in the way of something good”.

Mr Neil noted that it was possible that regulations in the two markets, EU and Britain, could diverge at some point in the future.

He explained that companies dealt with this problem at the moment by manufacturing to the highest standard, as this guaranteed access to either market.

More than 600 professionals working in compliance, regulation and related areas attended the A&L Goodbody summit, which was the fifth of its kind hosted by the law firm.

Kenan Furlong, partner in the firm’s disputes and investigations group, said it was delighted to welcome a broad range of speakers.

Discussions focused on regulation and enforcement, sustainability, coping with regulatory divergence and using artificial intelligence to manage compliance and risk.