Pennsylvania is a leader when it comes to helping companies sell their products and services overseas, and those efforts have pumped hundreds of millions of dollars into the Keystone State.
So says a recent report from the Brookings Institution, one of the country’s most respected think tanks. The paper, which detailed different states’ successes in making their businesses competitive in international markets, highlighted Pennsylvania’s Center for Trade Development.
One of the center’s best attributes is its method of measuring performance, says Emilia Istrate, report co-author and senior research analyst at the Brookings Institution’s Metropolitan Policy Program. The Center has 10 regional partners, each of which is charged with meeting the whole system’s goals in proportion with the percentage of the center’s budget it receives. In determining how well these goals are met, the center measures such things as the number of companies that have been assisted and how much money clients have earned thanks to exports.
Istrate says this strength serves as a model for other states, especially in this era of tight state budgets. “There are now clear numbers to show the impact of these programs,” she says. “In this day and age, it’s very important to show performance, to show what the state is spending its money on.”
Pennsylvania’s investment in export promotion has paid off big. In the 2008-09 fiscal year, the Brookings report says, the state brought in $454.5 million in export sales. That’s $60 for every dollar spent.
Source: Emilia Istrate, Brookings Institution
Writer: Rebecca VanderMeulen