Peter Carey (CEO Kildare County Council), His Excellency Mr. Richard Andrews – Australian Ambassador to Ireland and Allan Shine (CEO County Kildare Chamber).

 

On Tuesday 23rd April, County Kildare Chamber was privileged to host the Australian Ambassador to Ireland, His Excellency Mr Richard Andrews as Guest of Honour at a Chamber lunch in The Killashee Hotel.

The event was very well attended by key businesses in Kildare and in particular companies who are doing business or intend doing business in Australia.

 

His Excellency Mr. Richard Andrews – Australian Ambassador to Ireland

 

In welcoming the Ambassador, reference was made by the Chamber CEO Allan Shine of the strong reciprocal business relationships that exist between Australia and Kildare. Reference was also made to the fact that underlying those business relationships are the personal ties that substantially link both Kildare and Australia.

Ambassador Richard Andrews, said “The distance between the two countries meant that we’ve often neglected to understand the true significance and possibilities of our excellent relationship.  We would love to see more Australian companies here and we would also love to see more Irish companies in Australia using us as a bridgehead into Asia.

 

Ann Munnelly and Nicola Behan (BBA Ireland)

 

Agri-tech is an area in which both Australia and Ireland have strong expertise, and one where we’d expect the Australia-EU Free Trade Agreement currently under negotiation to open up new opportunities for our economies. Countries like Australia and Ireland will have an important role to play in solving the problem of feeding a growing global population sustainably, and it will be important for our farmers and our agri-tech sectors to work closely together,” said the Ambassador.

 

Closing the lunch, CEO of the Chamber Allan Shine presented the Ambassador with a hand crafted leather notebook specially designed by a local company CarveOn.

 

Robert Kennedy (CarveOn) and Rachel Kavanagh (Grenke)