07/06/2010
Southern Business & Development: Louisiana Earns Top Honors For Second Consecutive Year
Louisiana scores higher than all other
Southern states for new jobs and investment
BATON ROUGE, La. - For the second consecutive year, Southern Business & Development magazine
named Louisiana its Co-state of the Year, along with Tennessee. To
remain at the top of the annual SB&D
rankings, Louisiana secured more significant projects per capita
(measured by new jobs and capital investment) in 2009 than 16 other
Southern states.
"With our nation still enduring tough economic times and our
state facing thousands of job losses associated with the federal
deepwater drilling moratorium, our efforts to retain and attract
jobs are more important than ever," said Gov. Bobby Jindal. "We
don't want our kids to have to leave our state to pursue their
dreams; we want them to find their best career opportunities and be
able to raise their families right here in Louisiana. This
recognition by Southern Business &
Development is another sign that we have made the right
choice by making economic development our top priority since day
one."
In addition to Louisiana earning Co-state of the Year honors,
several of the state's metropolitan areas also received recognition
in the SB&D 100. Baton Rouge was
named the Mid-market of the Year for the second year in a row; and
Shreveport/Bossier City received Honorable Mention in the same
category. Monroe was named the Small Market of the Year; while
Houma earned Honorable Mention in the same category. New Orleans
earned Honorable Mention in 2009 in the major market category,
after being named the Major Market of the Year for 2008.
"When Gov. Bobby Jindal took office in January 2008, we set a
goal of becoming one of the best performing state economic
development agencies in the U.S., so we're obviously delighted to
be named Co-state of the Year by Southern
Business & Development for the second year in a row,"
said Louisiana Economic Development Secretary Stephen Moret. "We
are especially grateful and fortunate that Gov. Jindal and the
Louisiana Legislature have provided us the new tools necessary to
secure this terrific outcome, including our Business Expansion and
Retention Group, State Economic Competitiveness Group and Louisiana
FastStart™. Our aspiration is to position Louisiana to become the
economic powerhouse of the South. We've made great progress in that
direction, yet we know we have a lot of work left to do to position
Louisiana to outperform the South and the U.S. on a regular
basis."
Michael C. Randle, editor of Southern
Business & Development, wrote, "While Texas posted the
largest number of projects for the 17th straight year, it is
Louisiana and Tennessee who stand out because of their per capita
performances. Other than Kansas, no other states were even close to
Tennessee and Louisiana for the second straight year in the
all-important points per million ranking."
Lee Burlett of Southern Business &
Development wrote, "Louisiana is on a roll like we haven't
seen since Alabama's incredible run between 2003 and 2006 ... Just
a few years ago, it would have been unthinkable to write that
Louisiana had topped states, such as Georgia, Florida, North
Carolina and Virginia straight up in the number of large job and
investment generating corporate and industrial projects ... It used
to be that just about every significant economic development
project in Louisiana was somehow related to the oil and gas, marine
fabrication or the chemicals industry. That is no longer the case
as the state turned deals in a variety of industry sectors in
addition to those three sectors, including headquarters,
agribusiness, automotive, food processing, call centers, defense
and telecommunications, among others."
To calculate these rankings, Southern
Business & Development counts the number of companies
making public commitments of 200 jobs or more, or $30 million or
more in capital investment. The SB&D
100 consists of the 100 largest job and investment projects
announced in a calendar year. To read the full articles, visit www.SB-D.com.
