The number of Clare residents claiming unemployment benefits fell in February, bucking a trend of three successive monthly increases.
176 people left the county's dole queues last month, with reductions seen in all parts of the county.
However, despite this reduction, 9242 people are still claiming some form of unemployment benefit in the county.
More than half of these are in Ennis, where CSO figures show the live register fell by 80 last month to under 5,100.
A fall of 47 claimants in East Clare shows that the number of people signing on there is at it's lowest level since March of 2009 while North Clare has seen a reduction of 38 to 1567.
Last month also saw a smaller fall of 9 in the live register in West Clare, while the overall figure for the county is over 800 less than at the same point last year.
