Minister Seán Sherlock this week confirmed that a new Local Enterprise Office (LEO), which will service the North Cork area, is to be established in Mallow. The Minister’s announce-ment comes as part of the reforms of the county and city enterprise boards which are to be dissolved. This initiative forms a key part of the Government’s programme of public service reform and agency rationalisation.

Announcing Mallow as the location for the LEO, the Minister said, “I warmly welcome the decision to establish one of the 31 Local Enterprise Offices in Mallow and firmly believe that the services which it will provide will offer vital assistance and support to small and medium enterprises throughout the North Cork region. North Cork has seen a high rate of new businesses in recent years and it is these start-ups, along with the growth of existing small/medium businesses, that are esse-ntial to job creation and gaining economic momentum at local level”.

The Mallow Local Enterprise Office will offer a first-stop shop service to micro and small enterprises through supports such as mentoring, training and management development programmes overseen by Enterprise Ireland, a pathway into the range of Enterprise Ireland supports for high-growth companies with ambitions to export; advice on and access to a range of services from the Government, including Revenue, Credit Review Office, the Companies Registration Office; access to the range of support services (including planning and licensing) offered by the business support units of local authorities ; access to the various training services offered by SOLAS ; and access to the Microfinance Ireland Loan Fund. Companies with over 10 employees operating exclusively in the domestic market, which currently in most cases are not supported by the State, will be eligible for supports under the new system.

“The LEOs will draw and build on the successful County Enterprise Board (CEB) model which supports 33,000 jobs across the country, and will support 900 new projects per annum as well as approximately 25,000 training participants. However, it will bring together for the first time in a structured and coh-erent manner the skills, experience and resources of Enterprise Ireland, the CEBs and the Local Authorities to micro and small businesses”, said the minister.