This article has appeared in the February/March issue of 'Hotel and Restaurant Times'

Frank Corr

It would be nice to think of Ireland as ‘The Food Island’ with millions of tourists flocking here from all corners of the globe to sample our cuisine and enjoy an unforgettable gastronomic experience.
We are however a long way removed from that ‘Holy Grail’, despite the kind words of the  French ‘Le Guide de Routard’ and the combined efforts of  Failte Ireland, Bord Bia and the food and restaurant sectors.

The French travel guide surprised many of its readers and most Irish people last year when it described Irish restaurants as ‘unmatched internationally in quality, value and service’. One had to wonder if they had ever been to Lyon, Tuscany , Barcelona or New York.
It was nevertheless a nice complement and a confidence boost to a restaurant sector which claims to be struggling for survival. It also reflected a change in attitude to Irish restaurant food among overseas visitors who are now largely satisfied with the variety and quality of what is on offer, although they continue to complain about the prices.
Food Tourism is an important element in the total tourism mix. Defined as ‘travel to specific locations to sample cuisine unique to that area in order to gain a sense of place’, it is big business for destinations such as Tuscany, rural France, California and large swathes of Asia, the Middle East and Australasia. It remains in its infancy in Ireland however because, apart from a few peasant dishes, we do not have a national cuisine. We inherited our cooking initially from the British (who are hardly on the world map of great cuisines) and in more recent times have imported food and cooking styles from France, Italy, America, India, Thailand and China. Some visitors may come to Ireland for our food, but not for our native cuisine.
Failte Ireland and Bord Bia take a different spin on ‘Food Tourism’ however. They describe it as ‘the spending on food and beverages by overseas visitors and domestic holidaymakers’ and on this basis they value it at €2bn. in 2009 of which €1.5bn was spent on ‘away from home’ food and €500m. on alcohol and other beverages. The 2009 estimate is down on the €2.3bn attributed to 2008 when the sector peaked and will have fallen substantially with the continued downturn of tourism in 2010.

Even the more modest figure expected for 2010 does however ,  leave ‘Food Tourism’ as a  major contributor to the economy and a sector which merits development, promotion and management. The difficulty about accomplishing these objectives lies in the fragmented nature of the sector with thousands of  small food producers, a handful of major dairy and meat companies, more than 3,000 restaurants (including a diversity of ethnic eateries),  1,000 hotels, 7,000 pubs and assorted cafes, coffee shops, delis, petrol stations, chippers and farmers’ markets, all selling their wares to the public, including tourists. Managing such a demographic, amounts to something of a nightmare.
Failte Ireland realized this difficulty a few years ago and established a ‘National Food Tourism Implementation Framework’ which proposed a number of strategies. A Working Group headed by broadcaster  Derek Davis was established to drive the project forward. The Group produced  a report which stressed the importance of brand development within the sector, quality and value, business support for the sector , research and benchmarking. A detailed action plan was included with specific responsibilities allocated to state and industry stakeholders and deadlines for their completion. Work  is on-going and practical supports like the Failte Ireland Food Costing Toolkit have already emerged.
This project is indeed worthy, but is likely to be of long term strategic significance rather than immediately relevant to front line food tourism operators. The infantry of this ‘army’ are the restaurants who are experiencing difficult times indeed. The Restaurants Association of Ireland claimed in its recent pre-Budget submission that a restaurant is closing in Ireland every day, and although this claim may be difficult to prove (or disprove), the closure of  restaurants is there for all to see. A disconcerting aspect is that many of the restaurants being forced out of  business have been offering excellent food and service for many years, the most recent example being the Mermaid Café in Dublin.  Many other restaurants are struggling for survival. Yet food writer and Bridgestone Guide editor John McKenna claims that well-run restaurants are doing very well in many parts of the country. He says that good  restaurants have benefited from a form of ‘Darwinism’ where competitors that did not offer good service and value closed, leaving the best to benefit from discerning customers who could still afford to go out.
This view is supported by An Bord  Bia which last month commissioned a survey which showed that 46% of the population is still dining out at least once a week.

By far the most obvious trend in the restaurant sector however has been the sharp fall in meal prices in recent years. Upscale restaurants which were claiming in the boom years that they could not afford to sell a main course below €40 are now offering three course meals for €25. ‘Early Bird’ menus have become ‘Value Menus’ on offer all night every night and the sector abounds with special offers, discounts and incentives. These offers have emerged from an industry which is battling for survival, but which has also enjoyed the benefit of Government initiatives such as lower excise duties and a reduction in the Minimum Wage. This trend has certainly made dining out more affordable and is already having a beneficial impact on visitors. Latest research  indicates fewer complaints about high meal costs and an appreciation of the variety of food now available.

Ireland is a long way from being a Tuscany or California and the best we can hope for in the medium term, is that visitors will be pleased with the food they eat while on an Irish holiday, that some of it will reflect our heritage, that they are offered a wide choice of restaurants in various categories and that they will consider the food good value for money. We remain some distance however from achieving even these modest goals on a national and consistent basis. Certainly we have restaurants that tick all of these boxes, but they are concentrated in certain pockets of the country (West Cork, Galway, Dublin) while large swathes of Ireland remain gastronomic wastelands. A worrying percentage of visitors continue to mention dining as a negative rather than a positive experience (30% of  British ferry visitors and 25% of all German visitors) while tour operators complain about the lack of variety on hotel menus. ‘Can you offer our customers something other than chicken or salmon ?’ a representative of a major UK tour operator asked at a recent Failte Ireland seminar. Value also remains an issue despite recent improvements. The bottom line is that the cost of producing restaurant meals in Ireland is significantly higher than in many competitor destinations. It is not just the higher cost of the food itself , but the extravagant cost of doing business. Rents in many cities and towns remain unrealistic and operators are also saddled with soaring Local Authority and utility charges. At the other side of the ledger operate in a market which has become extremely price competitive. Little wonder therefore that many fail to square that circle or do so by tampering with the quality of their offering.

Ireland can produce some of the best meat, dairy produce and seafood in Europe and can confidently call itself ‘The Food Island’, but a lack of a native cuisine, a weakened restaurant sector and a fragmented food sector militate against us developing real ‘Food Tourism’ any time soon.

ends