New Fáilte Ireland Capital Investment Supports for Large Tourism Projects will provide a pool of €65m in investment to develop new, or boost existing, tourism experiences and attractions across Ireland. The scheme, which will run from 2016-2020, was officially launched by the Minister of State for Tourism and Sport, Patrick O’Donovan TD in Fáilte Ireland’s HQ in Dublin today.
The Capital Investment Supports for Large Tourism Projects have been designed to support large tourism projects with significant economic potential and the ability to:
- Boost overseas visitor growth;
- Create Jobs;
- Promote Fáilte Ireland’s existing destination brands – Wild Atlantic Way, Ireland’s Ancient East and Dublin a Breath of Fresh Air.
The funding for the Capital Investment Supports for Large Tourism Projects is drawn from Fáilte Ireland’s overall capital fund, which is valued at €125m over the next seven years.
Under the scheme, capital grants in excess of €200k and up to a maximum of €5m will be available and the scheme is open to applications from the public, private and voluntary sectors including community groups and support for commercial projects.
Speaking today, Minister O’Donovan said:
“This capital investment will allow us to support high impact projects around the country and will underpin our overall strategy for sustained tourism growth which benefits all the regions. The Government is committed to job creation, rural development and tourism growth and this type of funding allows us to deliver on all three.”
This grant scheme takes an innovation-friendly and outcome-led approach to financial support. Rather than being prescriptive in terms of the types of projects eligible for funding, the scheme instead emphasises the desired development outcomes and invites applications from potential projects which will help to deliver those outcomes.
Addressing this focus on outcomes, Fáilte Ireland CEO, Shaun Quinn emphasised:
“This support is central to the future development of the tourism sector. If we are to compete internationally as a compelling destination, we need to think big. Therefore, we wish to fund a number of big projects around the country which have the scale, the strength and the appeal to attract many more overseas visitors to our shores. We are also anxious to fund attractions and projects across all our destination brands and, ideally, we will have a good level of applications from all parts of the country.”
The Capital Investment Supports for Large Tourism Projects initiative will be a rolling programme (which means there is no deadline for applications) and the scheme, which goes live today, will run until 2020. You can find out more about the scheme, including how to apply, here.