Small business entrepreneurs urged to go green and look to export ...

Calvin Goings, who should know, says the U.S. Small Business Administration will always be concerned with helping the local restaurant or dry cleaner. But increasingly, the SBA is focusing its attention on helping small firms find opportunities overseas.Goings, administrator of the SBA's regional office in Seattle, said the Obama administration wants to double American exports, and the emphasis is paying off. Since the National Export Initiative was announced in 2010, about 5,500 companies exported for the first time, Goings said. Roughly 85 percent of the new exporters were small- or medium-sized companies.

"Ninety-five percent of the world's population is living somewhere else," Goings said during a break in a conference Thursday in Portland. "It's a business opportunity everyone should be thinking about."

The SBA offers loans and grants to help companies tap the export market, he said, and the Portland area is particularly well suited to take advantage. The region's "green" products and expertise can have wide application in other countries, Goings said.

If he were to start a business, Goings said he'd focus on "clean-tech" and intellectual services, and export ideas and services. "It plays into Portland's strengths," he said. "You're firing on all cylinders in Portland."

Goings' visit coincided with a conference aimed at helping small businesses involved in clean technology find funding and new markets. The conference was co-sponsored by the SBA and by Oregon BEST -- the Built Environment and Sustainable Technologies center.

The latter is a nonprofit, established by the Legislature, that connects entrepreneurs with a network of more than 200 Oregon university professors and their laboratory and research facilities. The goal is to use faculty expertise and labs to transform good ideas into commercially viable green products or services.

BEST President David Kenney said Portland has a competitive edge in the green economy, with a population that embraces "green lifestyles and technologies." Architects, planners and others working downtown are designing green buildings in China and sustainable cities in the Middle East, he said.

"Environmental stewardship and economic development go hand in hand," Kenney said.

Among other presentations, an SBA specialist encouraged small business owners to pursue federal contracts. The federal government has awarded more than $1 billion in contracts in 2012, with more than half of it going to small businesses, said Yuri Dyson.

"It's a huge pool of potential work," she said.

--Eric Mortenson

Source: http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2012/09/small_business_entrepreneurs_u.html

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