Norway Creates Jobs in the US
The Norwegian American Chamber of Commerce Mid-Atlantic Chapter interviewed Ms Nina Langli from the Norwegian Embassy on April 29, to discuss the project “Norway Creates Jobs in the US” to get a better understanding of the project and who the beneficiaries are.
📷Nina Langli works as a project manager at the Norwegian Embassy and is in collaboration with the Norwegian American Chamber of Commerce, Innovation Norway, Norwegian American Defense Industry Council, the Consul Generals, INTSOK and the Seafood Council conducting a project about Norway’s standing as a substantial investor in the US. For this specific project, the Embassy has developed a working group consisting of the Minister Counselor Mr Leif Trana, Counselor for Trade & Industries Mr Ivar Engan and the Counselor for Defense Industry Cooperation Mr Einar Gustafson. Being involved with all aspects of the project, Nina’s tasks ranges from development of concept, finding suitable methods, assess feasibility, collect and compute data, graphic design and more. As she explains, there are a lot of considerations behind every choice they need to make and the work is very comprehensive. The data we are searching for is not easily accessible so the key is to find the most efficient method to secure representative data and good estimates. Nina holds a Bachelor Degree in Business Administration & Commercial Law and is currently finishing her Master degree in International Business & Politics. Last year she had an internship at the Norwegian Embassy with Innovation Norway.
Tell us about the project “Norway Creates Jobs in the US” The Embassy has assumed a leading role in preparing a report about how Norway and Norwegian businesses contribute to employment and economic development in the US. We prepare a holistic overview of how many jobs Norwegian-affiliated companies support on the federal and state level. Our findings will be presented in form of a booklet that will contain several features that show the strong economical ties between Norway and the US. The project is a concrete measure to emphasize and highlight the importance of Norway’s considerable business footprints in the US and will contribute to promoting good and predictable framework conditions for Norwegian businesses in the US. The project seeks to benefit Norwegian companies by providing stronger influence and access to new arenas, notably Congress, the Administration, but also the general public. Increased visibility of Norwegian companies and their economic contributions is crucial to get contacts and breaking through with Congress. Further, it is important to create awareness about Norwegian companies and Norway’s standing as a substantial investor in the US as well as to increase business opportunities for Norwegian companies. There is a sentiment in the American system that when you give contracts to foreign industries, you steal American jobs. This report is aimed at proving that this statement is incorrect, it is in fact the opposite that has proven to be true: foreign industry established in the US increases the competitiveness of the US industry, contributes to creating more local jobs, and a stronger overall economy.
Tell us what expectations the Embassy has from collaborating with the different NACC Chapters: We hope every organization see the usefulness of this report and we believe that it will truly benefit the NACC chapters and their members. From the Embassy’s standpoint, we expect the Chapters to be collaborative throughout the project. Each Chapter’s responsibility will be to identify companies in their respective areas and submit information back to us. We also hope that this can be the beginning of more collaboration and joint projects in the future, so that we can increase the value for each stakeholder. Being in charge of the entire data gathering, I look forward to receiving the submission from each chapter at their earliest convenience so we can carry on with the next step of the project and follow our set timeline without delays. The project officially started in February this year, with anticipated timeline of one year. The project has come very far already and hopefully by the end of summer all the data will be processed so we can proceed with layout and design of the main booklet and related presentation materials.
What are the typical challenges you’ve experienced since the project started in February? It is a substantial task to find the right people to talk with and the right departments to reach out to when searching for and identifying all the companies and relevant data. It is therefore crucial to collaborate with every stakeholder and source organization that can help gather the needed data. Also, being located at one geographic point without personally meeting and interacting with the different resources across the States, it becomes a challenge to coordinate at full capacity.
In your opinion, what can NACC expect from participating in the project? It is expected that this project will strengthen the relationship between the Chapters and Norwegian diplomatic missions in the US. This project shows what the Chapters and missions can do for Norwegian businesses in the US. Through this initiative, we learn more about the companies that have operations in the US and hopefully NACC can expand their membership base and target new opportunities across all fifty States. To help visualize Norwegian Industry in the US, we will allocate space in the booklet for select Norwegian companies to promote their presence in the US and emphasize awareness of Norwegian industry’s impact in the market.
Norway Creates Jobs in the US is being sponsored by the Ministry of Trade, Industry & Fisheries and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The booklet will be available to everyone when published and the team working on the report is looking into potentially doing an electronic version as well.
We strongly encourage every NACC chapter to support this project and we look forward to the great benefits the final product will bring our members and our organization. If you wish to receive more information, please contact Nina Langli at nina.langli@mfa.no.
May 2015 Chloé Friberg Norwegian American Chamber of Commerce Mid-Atlantic Chapter
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