Slay and Dooley apply for Foreign-Trade Zone restructuring
KSDK
October 4, 2010
It's a move proponents believe will put St. Louis in a position to become China's hub of trade in the Midwest.
On Monday, Mayor Francis Slay and St. Louis County Executive Charlie A. Dooley revealed the City's and County's joint economic effort to restructure the Foreign-Trade Zone under the "Alternate Site Framework."
Both Slay and Dooley signed an application to restructure the Foreign-Trade Zone to include all of the City of St. Louis and St. Louis County.
Speaking at a press conference at Sigma-Aldrich in Midtown, the two touted the plan as one that will create new job opportunities for the area and help companies become more competitive in the export market.
The restructuring is supposed to lower the cost of doing international business for area companies, increase local participation in foreign trade, and position American manufacturers on an equal playing field with foreign competitors.
In a Foreign-Trade Zone, goods held for export aren't taxed by state or local governments. Customs duties and federal excise taxes are deferred on imports.
The move is also expected to better position the region for a Midwest-China Hub, which would theoretically create thousands of jobs in and around Lambert St. Louis International Airport. "It'll help us at Lambert Airport to create more cargo transfers and more landings and takeoffs of cargo airplanes which really help us economically... when we charge airlines we charge based on weight and cargo planes weigh more than passengers planes," explained Mayor Slay.
Slay also said he felt it was important to do business with China to improve St. Louis' international image and that someday it would lead to some passengers flights to and from Lambert to China. "We've got a great asset.. Lambert Airport has a tremendous amount of capacity we're not utilizing," he added.
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