Energy costs and supply chain difficulties are among the biggest issues facing the manufacturing sector at the moment, but energy rationing is not in prospect right now.
That is according to business group Ibec as it hosts its Manufacturing the Future conference in Galway this week.
Around 260,000 people are employed in the Irish manufacturing sector, which accounts for over 12% of total employment.
Irish manufacturers have grown their operations in recent years, despite the challenges posed by the pandemic and Brexit.
They are now facing added pressure on a number of fronts, exacerbated by the war in Ukraine.
"We've had acute energy cost inflation so certainly we are seeing major impacts across businesses," Sharon Higgins, Director of Member Services with Ibec told Morning Ireland
"We spend about €3 billion annually on natural gas and electricity and €1 billion on road transport fuels," she said.
"And our businesses have seen energy prices rise three to five times higher than this time last year so certainly major issues out there," she explained.
However, she said fuel rationing was not on the agenda right now, but there were measures that needed to be taken to support businesses that were most severely impacted.
"We need to support those using the measures that have been made available through the EU to mitigate the economic impact. But there are other things we need to do initially in terms of security of supply and looking to our renewables capability," she said.
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Those measures included a comprehensive national energy security review and ensuring backup for LNG (liquefied natural gas) options, Ms Higgins suggested.
"There's a lot that we can do right now to ensure that we don't get into those situations where there is any rationing of supply," she added.
Cost inflation across the manufacturing sector rose to a record high last month, the AIB Purchasing Managers Index for March showed.
That is being passed on by industry to end consumers which is contributing to the rise in inflation across the entire economy.
As well as cost increases and supply chain issues, all businesses are dealing with labour shortages.
"We need to look to ensure that we bring as many people hack into the workforce as possible as there has been some retrenchment. And we need to look at opportunities to bring in talent from outside of the country and using permit schemes and other options," Ms Higgins concluded.
