Facts & Figures

North Dakota’s manufacturing expertise and agricultural commodities are in increasing demand throughout the world. Canada, Western Europe, and increasingly Central Asia are all major destinations for North Dakota’s farm and manufacturing machinery expertise, and developing nations like Algeria, Nigeria, Nicaragua, India, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, Turkey are increasingly important purchasers of products made in North Dakota. Overall, exports support a fifth of all North Dakota manufacturing jobs.

Job Creation

• Trade supported 99,000 jobs in North Dakota in 2008, or 20.0% of total jobs, up from 11.5% in 1992.¹
• One-fifth (20.2%) of all manufacturing workers in North Dakota depended on exports for their jobs.²
• In 2008, 10,100 people in North Dakota were employed by U.S. affiliates of companies that are at least 50% foreign-owned.³

Exports and Growth

• North Dakota exported $2.5 billion in merchandise to foreign markets in 2010. North Dakota’s largest market in 2010 was Canada ($1.6 billion), followed by Mexico ($166 million), Australia ($68 million), Belgium ($54 million), and Germany ($37 million).⁴
• In 2008, 961 companies exported goods from North Dakota. Of these, 85% were small- and medium-sized enterprises with fewer than 500 employees.⁵
• Agricultural exports are important to North Dakota’s economy, totaling more than $3.9 billion and supporting about 45,173 jobs each year.⁶
• Since 2007, the U.S. Export-Import Bank has financed over $55.8 million in exports from 11 companies in 6 communities in North Dakota.⁷

Education and Research

• In 2008–2009, 248 North Dakota students studied abroad.⁸
• During 2009–2010, 2,884 international students were enrolled in North Dakota colleges and universities and contributed $57.4 million to the North Dakota economy.⁹

Global Engagement

• Since 1961, 521 Peace Corps volunteers from North Dakota have served in dozens of countries overseas.¹⁰

Download the Fact Sheet

1. http://businessroundtable.org/uploads/studies-reports/downloads/Trade_and_American_Jobs.pdf
2. http://ita.doc.gov/td/industry/otea/state_reports/
3. Anderson, Thomas and William J. Zeile. “U.S. Affiliates of Foreign Companies Operations in 2008”. Bureau of Economic Analysis, Department of Commerce. http://www.bea.gov/scb/pdf/2010/11%20November/1110_us_ops.pdf
4. http://ita.doc.gov/td/industry/otea/state_reports/
5. http://www.ita.doc.gov/td/industry/otea/state_reports/index.html
6. http://www.fas.usda.gov/info/factsheets/WTO/states.html
7. https://webappsprod01.exim.gov/apps/usmap/usmap.nsf
8. Institute of International Education. “Open Doors 2010 Report on International Educational Exchange Institute of International Education”. STUDY ABROAD BY U.S. STATE, http://www.iie.org/en/Research-and-Publications/Open-Doors/Data/Fact-Sheets-by-US-State
9. http://www.nafsa.org/publicpolicy/default.aspx?id=23158
10. http://multimedia.peacecorps.gov/multimedia/pdf/stats/homestates.pdf