HOUSTON – (By Michelle Leigh Smith) – Foreign-owned companies have made significant investments in Houston – a city with massive exports that have helped to create 347,000 new jobs in the last 14 years.
“There are now 1000 foreign owned companies and more than 300 greenfield projects in the Houston region since 2011 where foreign companies made a significant investment in the last five years,” says Patrick Jankowski, the Senior Vice President of Research for the Greater Houston Partnership. “Foreign firms account for 41 percent of all projects currently in the Partnership’s economic development pipeline.”
Jankowski made the observations at the recent “The State of Houston’s Global Economy,” at the Hilton Post Oak.
Around 45 countries have acquired firms in Houston since 2011. Brookings identified 5 percent of all jobs in the US are with foreign owned firms accounting 7.7 percent of total compensation, and 20 percent of all research and development in Houston is through foreign-owned firms.
How does Houston do it? “Part of it is that the growth feeds upon itself,” he says. “If you get a few foreign companies here, it attracts more. They tend to follow each other and they clearly see that it’s possible to be successful in Houston.”
IAH is the only North American airport with carriers offering nonstop flights to all six inhabited continents, offering more than 4,900 scheduled and charter flights per week.
Jankowski notes that Houston airports serve 70 international markets, with 19 foreign flag carriers, all serving 11.6 million passengers in 2016. New York City’s JFK airport serves 125 international markets, with Miami International hooking up with 106.
Intermodality and cargo handling infrastructure are equally as important. IAH has the 120-acre facility with more than 600,000 SF of on-airport warehouse space and parking space for 20 wide-body freighters. It also offers refrigerated warehouse space, animal and plant inspection facilities and on-site fumigation, allowing shippers to move their temperature sensitive freight quickly, preserving its value.
New Super Post-Panamax wharf cranes are among the landside and waterside improvements. On the import side, Port Houston is the fastest growing port in the US. in terms of loaded import containers from East Asia. A surge in export of plastic resin, a byproduct of the petrochemical process bodes well for Houston’s future.
Wiser Trade reports exports at $93 billion, and Brookings Institute says Houston exports are up 178 percent since 2003, creating 347,000 jobs.
Wiser Trade lists exports up 19 percent year-to-date, with Houston ranked at No. 5, behind, New York, Los Angeles, Laredo and Detroit. The ITA ranks Houston first, ahead of New York and Los Angeles. Crude and refined products account for 27 percent of those exports, chemicals are 14.6 percent and plastics, rubber and resins are 10.2 percent. Oil and gas extraction clocks in at 7.3 percent, with mining machinery at 6.1 percent.
Jankowski hit the point home about how great Houston’s export reach has become by saying it is much easier to name the places where Houston does not export goods. Don’t look for our polymers, our toluene or our ethylene in Vatican City, East Timor, Naura, Kirabati, Christmas Island, North Korea, Norfolk Island or Vanuatu. For that matter, forget Faroe Island, St. Helena, St. Pierre and Miquelon, Mayotte and Pitcairn Island or Svalbard, Jan Mayen Island. …. Otherwise, Houston-made plastics and chemicals go just about everywhere.
May 30, 2017 Realty News Report Copyright 2017