Commissioner: State on an economic development roll

11/09/07 Savannah Morning News

By Mary Carr Mayle

The economy may be sluggish elsewhere, but with seven major economic development announcements in the past week, Georgia is busier than ever, Georgia Department of Economic Development Commissioner Ken Stewart said Thursday.

"We're not seeing any slowdown in economic development in Georgia," Stewart told the GDEcD board, which had its November meeting in Savannah.

In addition to the flurry of announcements, Stewart pointed to the state's latest top-five rankings - Site Selection magazine named it the second-best in the nation to do business with and CNBC listed the state's business environment as the fourth-best in the country - as more evidence that Georgia is on an economic development roll.

To keep that momentum going, Stewart said, his department is working more closely with the governor's centers of innovation and focusing on such strategic industries as bioscience, energy, logistics and agribusiness.

"We're looking at those industries we as a state should be good at," he said.

With the emphasis on bioscience and energy already under way, the timetable calls for adding a logistics focus next spring, agribusiness next summer and advanced manufacturing in fall 2008. Business and finance and advanced communications will be added in 2009.

Georgia is ranked seventh in the country in the bioscience sector - the state's new moniker for life sciences. Some 250 bioscience companies employed more than 15,000 people statewide in 2006, with an additional 6,500 employees at the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, said Heidi Green, GDEcD deputy commissioner for global commerce.

In one of the state's most recent announcements, the groundbreaking Wednesday by Colorado-based Range Fuels for the nation's first commercial-scale cellulosic ethanol plant just outside Soperton, Gov. Sonny Perdue marked the state's commitment to cellulosic ethanol and other forms of renewable energy by proclaiming Georgia as the bioenergy corridor for the nation.

But biosciences and energy aren't the only industries Georgia's courting, Green said.

"From July 1 through October, we had 54 projects in the pipeline, generating more than 5,000 jobs and $673 million in investment," she said.

"Our investment numbers are up 28 percent, which speaks to the quality of the projects that are coming in."

Green said Georgia has most recently played host to officials from Spain, Japan, Brazil, the Dominican Republic and Israel.

"Our goal is to raise Georgia's visibility in key markets around the world," she said.