The majority of all recent immigrants to Ireland are young and single, census results have revealed.
Results of the 2006 population census, published today, showed that more than 68 per cent of all immigrants arriving in Ireland during the period 2005/2006 were single and 62 per cent of those were aged in their twenties.
The Central Statistics Office publication also highlighted an increase in mixed nationality families during the four year period 2002 to 2006 with an increase of nearly 25,000 mixed nationality families - up from 70,721 in 2002 to 95,636 in 2006.
The usual residence of most non-Irish nationals was in county Dublin, with 150,000 people (13 per cent of the total 1.16 million population) choosing to settle near the capital, while Galway city and county were host to the next largest group of non-Irish nationals - 10.7 per cent of the local population.
Kilkenny had the lowest percentage of non-Irish nationals at 7 per cent.
Some 40 per cent of the 2,646 residents in the small town of Gort in Co Galway, identified themselves as non-Irish nationals. Of these, some 83.3 per cent were Brazilian.
Meanwhile in Ballyhaunis, Co Mayo, 36 per cent of residents said they were non-Irish nationals. Of the 588 strong group, 327 people were EU nationals - mainly from Eastern Europe - and 163 were Asian.
Of the 122,000 people who immigrated into Ireland in the twelve months before the census, 83,000 (68.2 per cent) were single, and of these 51,700 (62.2 per cent) were in their twenties.
The census figures also reveal that 65 per cent of the 4.2 million usual residents of the State lived in their county of birth.
Cork city and county (76.9 per cent) had the highest proportion of its usual residents born in the same county followed by Donegal (73.5 per cent).
Some six out of ten people living in Meath in April 2006 were born outside the county followed by Kildare, where 59 per cent of residents were born outside the county. Meath and Kildare have become major commuter areas for Dublin in recent years.