EU heads of government meeting later this week will be asked to agree on new competition guidelines for inward investment.
The guidelines should meake it easier for countries like Ireland, which has lobbied hard for the measure, to attract inward investment by offering government subsidies and other state aids.
A recent investment by the microchip maker Intel at Leixlip, Co Kildare was subjected to a formal investigation by the European Commission's Competition Directorate because a package of incentives from IDA Ireland - including government grants - was used to win the investment in the face of competition from other countries outside the EU.
Taoiseach Bertie Ahern has argued that the Commission should not apply strict state aid rules in cases where investments were won using government subsidies, if the investment would otherwise have gone outside the EU.
EU leaders on Thursday will be asked to approve a Council conclusion calling on the Commission to recognise that the EU must be competitive in the global economy and be an attractive investment location in the global competition for inward investment.
In effect this would mean that IDA Ireland could continue to offer investment packages to attract international companies to Ireland, as long as those investments were seeking a global, rather than specifically EU, location.
