Louisiana Secretary of Economic Development Stephen Moret lectured business students Friday on broadening Louisiana’s economic horizons through nontraditional industries.
Moret, the first in the Flores MBA program’s distinguished speakers series this year, touted the economic status of the state through the recession.
“We are not back to a normal economic growth period, but we are doing an awful lot better than the rest of the country,” Moret said.
Moret said setting Louisiana on a course to grow at a rate to compete with the rest of the country is the ultimate goal.
Moret, a University alumnus, said Louisiana has lost employment during the recession, but the state is doing better than most of the South and is performing above the national average for employment. He credited that to improvements in the business climate during Gov. Bobby Jindal’s tenure.
During this time, Moret said the state has secured about 100 major projects to create almost 40,000 direct and indirect jobs and $8.5 billion in private sector investment.
The state is growing significantly faster than the nation’s average since the end of the recession, Moret said. The past three years mark the first time in 25 years the state had more people moving in than moving out.
But sustaining that growth at a rate brisk enough to compete nationally is a long-term issue to be solved by providing robust increases in employment opportunities, Moret said.
Moret said Louisiana is currently handicapped in its capacity to grow employment because a disproportionate share of its economy is in industries that are being automated nationwide by technological advances.
So the challenge, Moret said, is to identify new growth-oriented industries the state can become leaders in.
“Our No. 1 growth target for industry in the state over the next 20 years is digital media and software development,” Moret said. “There are a variety of segments that have double-digit growth potential as far as the eye can see. We are going to be a major player in that space.”
The past decade has seen Louisiana jump to third in movie production nationally, but Moret said the film industry as a whole isn’t one of the major growth industries rather most of the state’s business is market share shifts from other states.
Moret said the state has identified six major growth targets including becoming “the Netherlands of the U.S.” in regard to water management.
This, along with making advances in renewable energies, being a part of the next advances in automotive manufacturing, becoming a health care destination for people around the world and bolstering the traditional energy industry through segments like ultra deepwater drilling are the major areas Louisiana should expand into, according to Moret.
“As we look at the economy in 2011, it is going to be a great year for business.” Moret said. “It’s going to be a year of recovery, a year of rebuilding and a year of major new industrial projects.”
 
 
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Contact Xerxes A. Wilson at [email protected]