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Ireland has a policy of encouraging large number of students to come from India, says Mr Feilim McLaughlin, Ambassador to India.
“We have set up a brand called Education Ireland. Ireland is a strong destination, particularly for post-graduate study,” he added.
VISA REGIME
With this in mind, the country has suitably structured the visa regime, he said during a visit to The Hindu office here.
“More generally, there's a waiver for inbound tourists in that if you have a visa for the United Kingdom you don't need a separate visa for Ireland,” the Ambassador said.
There are 3.7 lakh tourists travelling between India and the UK. “Our target is to see that at least 10 per cent of them go on to visit Ireland,” Mr McLaughlin said.
OPENING UP
On the education front, what is happening in Ireland is exactly opposite to what is obtaining in the UK.
“We're trying to differentiate ourselves a little here in that while there's a little squeeze in the UK, we're trying to open up,” says Mr Patrick O'Riordan, Commercial Counsellor, Embassy of Ireland.
Post-grad students are allowed to work full-time during their vacation period. The system allows for lots of flexibility.
There are high-paying jobs for the asking if one has a good biomedical sciences degree or high-end computation skills.
According to Mr McLaughlin, the education institutions system works closely with the industry.
Being predominantly an employment-oriented syllabus, there are ample opportunities for placements with facilities owned by Microsoft, Dell, Intel, Google, FaceBook etc.
“Our strategy has been to keep taxes as low as possible, to create clusters wherever possible and make a small nation the best destination for business,” he added.
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