FDBusiness.com

The development of FoodCentral, a national food park, strategically located on a 113-hectare site beside Dublin Airport and close to Dublin Port, is now underway in Ireland. A master plan focused on creating a new world-class food park has been agreed with Fingal County Council, the local authority.

FoodCentral will provide an opportunity for the phased development of a diverse range of food and drink related business operations in an attractive and sustainable environment. Not only does the site provide a strategically located gateway to Ireland’s food market for overseas companies wishing to locate near Dublin, it also provides an excellent location for businesses to establish processing operations or distribution hubs for the domestic or export markets. Over time, food related education, training and ancillary activities will also become established.

FoodCentral has an optimal location for receiving and producing food products and distributing them nationally from the population centre in Dublin. Approx 75% of Ireland’s retail food distribution operates from within a 25 km radius of FoodCentral.

Businesses currently located in FoodCentral and employing over 1,000 people include a number of Keelings and Donnellys operations as well as UK-based food service company, Brakes. The existing businesses in the food park encompass a range of growing; food related processing and packing, food service and logistics operations. These diverse businesses are both competitors and co-operators in a number of respects involving shared services and inter-company trade.

FoodCentral aims for food and drink businesses locating within the park to foster co-location synergies and benefits. A wide scope of activities can be optimised to commercial and financial advantage. These activities include manufacturing, processing, logistics, innovation, research and development, sustainability, marketing, exhibition and administration.

“As FoodCentral develops with both existing and new businesses, its potential to deliver an environmentally attractive food park, harnessing synergies, sharing services, generating new opportunities and adding value to the food and drink sector can be realised in an environment which could generate up to 5,000 sustainable jobs, in a wide spectrum of activities,” comments William Keeling, FoodCentral’s managing director.