While people outside West Virginia know about our state from the memorable “Country Roads” song by John Denver, there are other positive aspects to the Mountain State’s reputation.
We continue to be a national leader in energy production, which is great for our economy, but it is just as important that we remember the critical relationship between energy and manufacturing, as the future looks bright for both industries.
Look at the numbers. The role manufacturing plays in the economic future of West Virginia moving forward is significant, adding $8.8 billion to the state’s economy, comprising 8.1% of state’s GDP and employing more than 44,000 workers. Goods manufactured in West Virginia worth $4.3 billion are exported around the world, including to Canada, China, Belgium, Mexico and Germany, and that number continues to grow. In the past few years, we have seen historic investments of new companies planting roots here at home and other existing companies expanding their operations.
With new investments continuing to pour in, paired with an increased focus on trades education at the high school and post-secondary levels, there is an air of anticipation and excitement on the positive impact manufacturing is making. Jobs are growing rapidly in the Eastern and Northern Panhandles, along the Ohio River, and here in the Kanawha Valley. Those investments will produce a need to fill 7,000 jobs in the next three years, based on a study from Marshall Advanced Manufacturing.
Whether it is steel and titanium, custom wood furniture, mining equipment, distilled beverages or essential infrastructure to power our country in the form of transformers and transmission lines, manufacturing is poised to change the economic landscape in a positive way here in West Virginia. We are in exciting times, as the continued expansion of manufacturing adds fuel to the economic engines already at work.
The West Virginia Manufacturer's Association will showcase many of our state's manufacturers at the Capitol in Charleston when we host Manufacturing Day at the Legislature from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Thursday. Many of these thriving and evolving industries will be on site, helping to represent the more than 1,000 manufacturers located here that produce products that enrich our lives and other local businesses depend upon.
Economic development is more than just jobs, it also creates career pathways that provide manufacturing employees with the opportunity to build a life so they can choose to stay here right here where they belong, in West Virginia.
Bill Bissett is president of the West Virginia Manufacturer's Association.
