Administrator Maria Contreras-Sweet, head of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA), today announced $186,500 to support export growth among small businesses in West Virginia. The funding was awarded through SBA’s competitive State Trade Expansion Program (STEP).
“Exporting provides tremendous opportunity for small businesses and entrepreneurs. Two-thirds of the world’s purchasing power can be found outside of the United States, but only about one percent of America’s 28 million small businesses are reaching customers beyond our borders. Exporting is an important growth opportunity for small businesses ready to expand their reach into new and increasingly borderless global markets. These STEP awards, in addition to SBA’s export loans and U.S. Export Assistance Centers, help small businesses across our nation have the tools, resources and relationships they need to take their businesses global.”
“Small businesses in West Virginia are increasingly engaging in the ever evolving global market place,” said SBA Mid-Atlantic Regional Administrator Natalia Olson-Urtecho. “Through our STEP awards, the West Virginia Department of Commerce Development Office can transform more small businesses to become exporters and expand their export sales. In the process, these small businesses create jobs and strengthen communities.”
STEP awards were created to advance key priorities identified in the President’s National Export Initiative, namely to expand the base of small businesses that become exporters and to make the exporting process as easy as possible for small businesses. Recipients of STEP awards in the first three rounds (FY 2011, 2012, 2014) reported a strong return on federal taxpayer investment, generating $22 in U.S. small business export sales for every $1 awarded.
These awards are granted to U.S. states and territories to support programs that help small businesses expand their export-related activities. This includes participation in foreign trade missions, foreign market sales trips, subscription services for access to international markets, as well as the design of international marketing campaigns, export trade show exhibits, export training workshops and more.
The state of West Virginia will use STEP award funds to support export development for eligible small business concerns through state trade missions, international trade shows, foreign market sales trips, services offered by the U.S. Commercial Service, and other tools to explore selling their products and services in global markets. West Virginia trade missions are scheduled to the United Kingdom, Ireland, India, South Korea, Japan, and China.
STEP funds allow small businesses the opportunity to meet foreign buyers face-to-face at trade shows or on trade missions, and complement SBA’s export loan guaranty programs, which can finance the working capital needed to complete export orders and in turn help finance the expansion of production facilities due to export success. Loans are available up to $5 million. More information can be obtained from SBA’s Export Finance Mangers located at 21 U.S. Export Assistance Centers across the country.
Awardees were determined via a competitive process, as required by the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act of 2015.
