Ballymena Chamber President Alan Stewart welcomed guest speaker Kevin Kingston, NI Chamber of Commerce President & Deputy CEO and Managing Director of Business Banking at Danske Bank and 60 business leaders from around the Borough to their ‘Business Breakfast Networking Forum’ on Wednesday morning. 

Kevin explain that the current economic forecasts for the Northern Irish economy were looking positive with growth expectations of 2.5% but went onto state that more needed to be done. “Local businesses in Northern Ireland must consider exports as an important ingredient for our overall recovery and sustainable growth”. Kevin went onto state that “The Republic of Ireland was Northern Ireland’s biggest trading partner. A large percentage of our exports are due to the recovery of the Republic of Ireland. Their recovery and sustained growth is essential to Northern overall economy triggers”. Kevin finished by stating “50% of Northern Ireland’s manufacturing exports are accounted for by just 10 companies and the largest firms (250+ employees) account for 70% of our exports”.

L-R – Rodney Kernohan (Business Development Manager, Ballymena Chamber of Commerce), Ann McGregor MBE, (Chief Executive, NI Chamber of Commerce), Kevin Kingston, (President, NI Chamber of Commerce), Mayor Audrey Wales MBE, Alan Stewart, (President, Ballymena Chamber of Commerce), Graham Lapsley, (Head Of Finance Centre, Danske Bank Ballymena).

It was obvious from the morning’s business networking event that export opportunities must be grasped if available. Small to medium sized businesses in the Borough area have a network of professional working groups to help and offer them advice such as Ballymena Chamber of Commerce, and Invest Northern Ireland. Kevin went onto explain the importance of networking groups such as Ballymena Chamber’s approach to creating business events like these and why it was so important for local businesses to network, meet, strategies and support each-other.

Ballymena Chamber President Alan Stewart thanked Kevin for his support. Alan explained the benefits of Chamber membership by demonstrating no matter what size of business you came from, whether it was big industry, an SME business or sole-trader, a proactive Chamber of Commerce can offer any business many flexible levels of on-the-ground support & advice.