Department for Enterprise...

Welsh Assembly Government: Enterprise, Innovation and Networks

The Department for Enterprise, Innovation, and Networks delivers the economic and transport agendas set out in Wales: a Better Country, Wales: a Vibrant Economy, and The Transport Framework. In doing so, it works with partners across the Welsh Assembly Government and beyond. The Minister responsible for the Department is Andrew Davies, AM.

The Department’s principal functions are:

* supporting job creation and helping individuals to tackle barriers to participation in the world of work
* investing to regenerate communities and stimulate economic growth across Wales
* helping businesses by supporting entrepreneurship, innovation, inward investment, trade, and skills as drivers to growth
* ensuring that all economic programmes and policies, especially those for clean energy generation and resource efficiency, can support sustainable development
* building a world-class 21st-century transport system that provides affordable, environmentally friendly road, rail, and air transport for business access to markets and personal travel, especially commuting
* building on Wales’ already formidable ICT network

The Department’s work on behalf of the people and communities of Wales is very wide ranging. Stakeholders include local authorities, academic and financial institutions, voluntary organisations, the private sector, our customers, the Wales Office, and all users and providers of our transport networks.
Structure of the Department

Andrew Davies is the Minister responsible for the Department and Gareth Hall is the lead civil servant. A staff of some 1,700 who bring a wide variety of expert professional abilities to their work in the Department’s operational divisions.

The Department has offices across Wales in Aberystwyth, Cardiff, Colwyn Bay, Newtown, St Asaph, Swansea, and Treforest.

Its International Business Wales team has bases in North America, mainland Europe, China, India, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and London.. The work of International Business Wales focuses on:

• maintaining and enhancing the global profile of Welsh business

• attracting inward investment into Wales

• securing export business and promoting international trade for Welsh companies

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Welsh enterprise department 'will be world-class'

The revamped Welsh Assembly Government now has a better focus on boosting business success, Cardiff's enterprise minister has said.

In April this year the devolved administration reshuffled its organisation and launched a new Department for Enterprise, Innovation and Networks.

Speaking at a business conference on Tuesday, Andrew Davies said the new structure would produce better policies.

It had "brought together the best features of the merged organisations in order to provide a world-class service", he said.

"And in the first two months of the new Department for Enterprise, Innovation and Networks – a mission statement in itself – we are encouraging enterprise and innovation, and we are ensuring we deliver the networks that a modern economy needs – transport infrastructure and broadband links."

The department is in its early days, he added, but had established a firm foundation for the future.

"We'll be open minded, willing to learn best practice from anywhere in the world, and we'll have a culture of challenge, constantly reviewing and evaluating what we do and why we do it," he said.

"We have a team committed and able to deliver a step change in the way we deal with the challenges of a dynamic Welsh economy in a competitive global setting."

Davies also said the Cardiff administration would set about "building a Welsh economy that is holding its own in the competitive global arena".