March 2009
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Tom Sawyer Company (TSC) President and CEO Carolyn Sawyer, along with a group of other business leaders from the Palmetto State, have extended the arm of economic investment in South Carolina halfway around the world. Sawyer and about 15 others were invited to participate in a trade mission to the United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) capital city of Dubai.
Since the discovery of oil in the late 1970’s, the United Arab Emirates has come a long way from a poor desert region to the modern state it is today. In the past 30 years the UAE, particularly Dubai, has experienced an unbelievable construction boom to accommodate the country’s growing economy and population. This has caused the country to import almost everything it has.
In 2007 South Carolina exports to the UAE were up 12 percent from 1997, at $2.3 billion from $20.6 million. In the first half of 2008, U.S. exports to the UAE were up 42% from the same period in 2007, making the UAE the fastest growing market among the United States’ top 20 export markets. “This mission is an opportunity to meet with businesses in a country that has huge expansion potential,” according to Sawyer. She says the area is ready to test its limits, with numerous companies looking to buy S.C. products and services.
Palmetto State exports to the UAE are growing more quickly than exports from the U.S. as a whole, up 76%. In fact, South Carolina ranked among the top ten states in terms of total exports during the first half of 2008. As one of the Middle East’s most progressive countries, the UAE offers tremendous opportunities to S.C. companies looking to find distributors and representatives with the ability to sell their products and services all over the region.
Late last year, JAFZA International, a unit of Dubai World and a state-owned company, announced their decision to buy land in Orangeburg County. TSC worked with the Orangeburg County Economic Development Commission in putting together the economic summit where JAFZA unveiled their plans for investment in Orangeburg County. The company plans to build a massive warehouse system, transportation hub, and business park on over 1300 acres of land in Orangeburg County, near Santee. The planned $600 million project is estimated to generate thousands of jobs and is a prime example of the type of economic development opportunities that South Carolina can create by attracting UAE businesses to the state.
This is the Tom Sawyer Company's fourth invitation to participate in a trade mission. Previous missions have included a U.S. Commerce Department mission for small, minority and women-owned businesses, a South Africa-South Carolina mission, followed by a trade mission to the United Kingdom. Participation in these earlier trade missions led to TSC contracting with the U.S. Department of Commerce and the State Department.