Official figures show that industrial production weakened slightly in the final three months of last year, despite a strong December.
The Central Statistics Office said the volume of production from October to December was 1.4% lower compared with the third quarter of 2011.
Provisional figures for 2011 as a whole show that the volume of industrial production rose by 1.6%. This represents a sharp slowdown from the 8.3% growth in 2010.
For December, production was 3.5% up from November, but 4.1% lower compared with December 2010.
The modern sector - which includes technology and chemicals - showed a 7.4% annual fall in December, while there was a 0.7% drop in production in the traditional sector.
