A series of academic research studies and official policy documents has identified the persistent poor performance of the Northern Ireland economy, which has continued despite considerable expenditure on an industrial development programme. This poor performance of the regional economy reflects both generally low levels of productivity in Northern Ireland industry (despite considerable investment in plant and equipment) and a lack of both price and nonprice competitiveness (in areas such as product quality, design and training). In turn, this is reflected in the poor export performance of much of the indigenous manufacturing sector (Harris et al 1990; Hitchins et al 1990).