ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, December 16, 1996 TAG: 9612160108
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-6 EDITION: METRO
SERIES: Second of a Series
WESTERN Virginia should get more aggressive about expanding its export business. Why?
In part, because it's there. Regardless of how effectively our particular region and its businesses choose to participate in the global economy, globalization will continue to accelerate. The question is whether Western Virginia will be its master or its victim.
Also because, as we editorially noted yesterday, places like Western Virginia and the Roanoke Valley are well-suited for exports growth. Our region has an exporting tradition on which to build, and the fastest growth in exports nationally is occurring among small-to-medium firms and in small-to-medium metro areas.
Beyond all that, increased exporting dovetails with the kind of economic growth that would most benefit the region.
According to a study released this year by The Manufacturing Institute and the Institute for International Economics, workers in companies that export earn from 5 to 15 percent more than workers in comparable companies that don't. Workers in companies that export are less likely to be laid off; their employers, less likely to go out of business; their productivity, up to 20 percent higher.
Exports growth, in other words, doesn't just mean jobs. It means better jobs.
This is no coincidence. In the global marketplace, America's comparative advantage does not lie in products whose saleability depends on cheap labor and land. For those kinds of products, U.S. exporters can't compete with Third World countries where labor is less skilled and whose economies are less developed.
America's advantage lies, rather, in the high value its knowledgeable workers can add to products and services. This kind of advantage is built on such national attributes as an educated work-force, a penchant for technological and other innovation, and a free and stable political system.
Which doesn't mean such attributes can be taken for granted. Regions that fail to harness their educational resources, such as research universities, or that lack coherent civic leadership will be left behind.
Nor does it mean that a regional economy such as ours can compete in export markets only with products and services that are in themselves high-tech marvels. In the York, Pa., metro area, The Christian Science Monitor reported recently, a window-screen manufacturer is helping fuel exports growth. In LaCrosse, Wis., microfilm and microfiche readers - obsolete technology in the United States - are in high demand in places like India. Significant Western Virginia exports range from furniture to high-tech fiber-optic components.
The trick for businesses, large and small, is to become skilled at recognizing export opportunities, and knowledgeable about tailoring their products and marketing to other cultures. Moreover, many seemingly low-tech goods can be competitive internationally because of smart or high-tech production techniques.
Such diversification is welcome not only because it's a key to gaining more export business. For regional economies, diversification - and sales in more widespread markets - can help smooth the impact of ups and downs in any particular sector.
Next: How can Western Virginia boost its exports?
LENGTH: Medium: 63 linesby CNB