[ Cork City Development Plan 2022-2028, Section 15(2) Two-Year Progress Report ]
Cork has already become a European hub for sectors including sustainable energy, information security and life sciences such as the pharmaceutical, medical devices and biotech industries. Cork City consistently ranks highly in Europe for economic potential foreign direct investment (FDI) strategy and business friendliness. In 2022 and 2023 Cork City was voted the number 1 small European city for economic potential. In 2022 and 2023 it was also ranked the second best small European city overall. It also featured in the top 10 for business friendliness and FDI strategy for these years. In 2024 Cork City was named top small European city for FDI strategy, ranked in the top 3 for economic potential and business friendliness and number 4 overall in the small European cities category. Cork City Council is charged with leading economic development and strives to ensure that a range of job opportunities are available to ensure that the city can continue to innovate while ensuring social inclusion and just transition. In general terms, these SDG targets are contextualised in the City Development Plan in Strategic Objective 6 which supports Cork City’s role as the economic driver for the region and the creation of a strong, resilient, diverse and innovative economy, and enabling a just transition to a low carbon economy. The City Development Plan has more indirect impacts on Targets 8.1 and 8.5, but the Plan along with the Local Economic and Community Plan (LECP) provides a strong policy and action base for economic growth in the city, which is important for the entire region and in a wider national context considering Cork’s the role as the principal complimentary location to Dublin. Objectives in chapter 7 (under Strategic Objective 6) seek sustainable economic growth and economic diversification and support job creation and innovation. Objectives 7.1 and 7.2 support the delivery of a wide range of economic strategic plans and initiatives from local, regional and national stakeholders. Target 8.2 is contextualised to Cork City in objectives related to education and skills (Objective 7.7) and technology-based industry (Objective 7.14). Targets 8.3 and 8.9 have a more direct application to the City Development Plan; the Plan’s identification of strategic employment sites (Objective 7.1) and objectives relating to economic clusters (Objective 7.3) speak to Target 8.3 while the suite of tourism objectives (Objectives 7.25, 7.26, 7.29) relate to the promotion and growth of sustainable tourism. Target 8.4 is linked to targets 12.2 and 12.5 (see SDG 12 below). The positive impact of the City Development Plan is evident in permissions granted for strategic employment locations in the city, including an expansion of strategic sites for large scale employers, both foreign and indigenous, a new business school for UCC in the city centre and various other sites across the city, as referenced in the main body of the two-year progress report. While there have been no significant new retail developments in the city centre, there has been notable retail activity with vacant units being occupied by new traders and development plans being progressed for a number of strategic properties in the city centre.
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