Area Development Magazine Awards South Carolina the 2012 Gold Shovel and Project of the Year
June 13, 2012
South Carolina receives top honors and national recognition for economic development efforts
June 13, 2012 – Area Development magazine, a national,leading economic development publication, has awarded South Carolinawith its 2012 Gold Shovel award for the state’s economic developmentefforts last year. In addition, South Carolina also received themagazine’s “Project of the Year” award.
“It’s exciting to see our state recognized again with this award foreconomic development. South Carolina has built a reputation for having abusiness-friendly climate and a talented workforce, and these and otherfactors have certainly played a role in landing the large deals we’veseen over the past few years,” said Gov. Nikki Haley.
Area Development magazine recognizes states in four populationcategories that have recruited the highest quality and most jobs percapita, which have broken ground in the previous year. This year marksthe seventh year of the awards. South Carolina was the Gold Shovelwinner this year in the 3 – 5 million population category.
“The Gold Shovel is a great recognition of our economic developmentaccomplishments. These accomplishments would not be possible without thestrong team effort of state and local leaders, economic developmentprofessionals and business leaders who have and will continue tocontribute to our state’s recruitment success. We will strive to buildon these efforts going forward,” said Secretary of Commerce Bobby Hitt.
Last year, South Carolina was also awarded a Gold Shovel for itseconomic development efforts. The state has previously been awarded asilver shovel in both 2009 and 2010.
South Carolina also received Area Development’s “Project of the Year”award for work on the Continental Tire the Americas LLC. In October,Continental Tire announced plans to build a new tire manufacturing plantin Sumter County, as well as expand its corporate headquarters inLancaster County. The company committed to invest $500 million andcreate 1,700 jobs in the state.
For more information on the award application process and to see a full listing of all the awards, please visit http://www.areadevelopment.com/awards.
About S.C. Department of Commerce
As South Carolina’s leading economic development agency, the Departmentof Commerce works to recruit new businesses and help existing businessesgrow. Commerce received the Silver Award from Business Facilitiesmagazine, placing second in the 2011 Economic Development Deal of theYear competition. Commerce has been part of recruiting world-classcompanies to South Carolina such as Boeing, Bridgestone, Continental, Monster.com,Heinz, ZF Group, BMW and Google Inc. Commerce also supports small andexisting business, rural development initiatives and offers grants forcommunity development. For more information, visit www.SCcommerce.com.
