An International Strategy for One Maryland
Annapolis, Maryland
November 23, 2009
(As Prepared)
Thank you Secretary McDonough,… thank you to all our moderators, Jane Nishida, Sharon Pinder and Signe Pringle -- and thanks to all of you for joining us today.
Increasingly, our game plan for making progress in the State of Maryland is focused on the three most fundamental ingredients for prosperity, quality of life, and a strong, diverse, growing middle class.
What are they? Jobs, Jobs, and,… jobs.
The work that so many of you are doing, day in and day out, to strengthen the connections between our State and our partners in every part of our world is fundamental to our ability to create, protect, and place our fellow citizens in jobs in the high growth, high potential sectors of our economy.
It’s fundamental to our ability to protect the jobs of 105,000 people in our State who work at foreign-owned companies, and to create more quality jobs.
It’s fundamental to our ability to protect and expand the more than 639,000 jobs which are supported by our export economy.
And it’s fundamental to everything we’re trying to do together as a State,… Just as our world is growing increasingly more connected by the day, so too are the priorities we share. What are they? To strengthen and grow the ranks of an increasingly diverse, upwardly mobile middle class – including our family owned businesses and farms. To improve public safety and public education in every part of our State. And to expand opportunity: the opportunity to learn, the opportunity to earn, the opportunity to enjoy the health of the people we love and the environment we love.
These priorities are all connected. They all depend on our ability to create, protect, and place our fellow citizens in quality jobs. And therefore – they all require our State to look beyond our national borders; to strengthen our connections with global partners in shared pursuit of progress.
Science, Security, Skills: New Ideas for New Jobs
We are all here because we recognize that our world is growing smaller, more crowded, and more connected by the day. And we are here because we understand the urgent need to transform our economy, to promote innovation, and to create new jobs,… to compete and prosper in the increasingly knowledge-based, increasingly connected 21st century global economy.
We are here because we recognize that in this rapidly changing world, the major task ahead of us as a State – as One Maryland – is to strengthen the connections which fuel innovation and create jobs and progress,…
Connections which advance progress in science – progress toward healing our neighbors, our planet, and our economy.
Connections which advance progress in security – protecting our streets and neighborhoods from crime and grime. Protecting our people from public health challenges. Protecting our homeland from threats old and new.
Connections which advance progress in skills and education – the primary ingredients of innovation and job growth.
And connections which advance a renewal of the human spirit – recognizing that at the end of the day our greatness as a society isn’t about how many smart bombs we can drop on our neighbors half a world away, but how many smart, compassionate hands we can offer to our global neighbors,… how we can proliferate what’s been called “weapons of mass salvation.”
To create jobs and strengthen these connections, working together we’ve created the Maryland International Business Center. We’ve convened the Governor’s International Advisory Council. We’ve launched the Maryland International Incubator and opened foreign offices in locations across the world,..
… And we continue in tough economic times to make record investments in our #1 ranked, best in the nation public schools so that we can continue to have one of the most highly educated workforces anywhere in the world. And we continue to put a renewed priority on the STEM disciplines of science, technology, engineering and math – subjects where American students are losing ground to other countries.
Conclusion
It’s all about connection. It’s all about jobs. It’s all about progress. And it’s all about the stronger future we prefer not only for ourselves, but for the next generation.
Science, security, skills: new ideas for new jobs in Maryland.
