However, with new, highend courses continuing to come on stream in this country, the opposite appears to be true. Moyvalley in county Westmeath, Killeen Castle in neighbouring Meath, as well as Blarney Golf Resort, designed by Darren Clarke, Jack Nicklaus and John Daly respectively, are just a few examples of parkland lay-outs which are about to hit the market.

The investors behind these and other new facilities clearly see them as commercially viable, and with the cost of building a championshipstandard course now conservatively estimated at 25m, presumably they have crunched the relevant financial numbers.

Increasingly, the trend is to attempt to claw back the money spent on design and building by developing housing around the course, a trend which has already been in evidence at established venues such as Mount Juliet, the K Club and Carton House.

But against this backdrop of investment in parkland, Failte Ireland's Director of Golf, Damien Ryan, believes a note of caution is needed.

"We have wonderful parkland courses, and I'm certainly not against them being developed per se, but right now, I think someone has to say enough is enough. We have probably reached saturation point."

While Ryan is adamant that Failte Ireland will promote all of the country's new courses, there are no guarantees that sufficient green fee revenue from tourism will be forthcoming.

"There are no worries where links are concerned as by and large they are covered by visitors from America, " he says, "but I fear there could be casualties if the development of parkland courses continues. You can build a course, then make the money back on property development, but to run a top-class championship course costs about 1.25m a year. When the money has come in from property sales, how is that 1.25m going to be generated?

"Failte Ireland cannot guarantee to anyone that we will be able to bring in enough visitors to deliver that sort of revenue."

Apart from the possibility of some courses facing severe financial difficulties in the future, Ryan also believes that the current high standards offered by the Irish market could drop.

"There have been instances in Spain and Portugal where, after the housing has been completed, insufficient money has been put back into the maintenance of the course. At the moment, we have probably the best blend of links and parkland courses in the world, but we can't afford to let the standard drop."

If the future for Adare Manor, which manages to attract its share of overseas and domestic visitors, appears to be healthy due to a superbly-appointed course as well as top-quality accommodation, it is difficult to be as optimistic for every new development, according to Ryan.

"A lot of people are now trying to eat from the same cake, " he explains. "Take some of the parkland courses in the Dublin area who are battling for our own corporate market which is shrinking. Against that sort of backdrop, surely we have to call a halt to development.

"If Ireland is going to maintain its place as a top golf destination, how far are we going to go with this development?

If someone comes along and says that another three links courses are being built, then that's wonderful because the market is clearly there. But for commercial parkland courses which need green fee revenue, the future is less certain."