Parish shines to delegates from ‘across the Pond’

The North Sea, which borders the east coast of Great Britain, and the Gulf of Mexico have been producing oil in abundance for decades.

So, it’s only natural that British companies with experience working with North Sea oil producers may be interested in establishing operations in the Houma area, which has been a longtime hub for companies servicing the oil production industry.

On Friday, the Terrebonne Economic Development Authority (TEDA) hosted a delegation of British business executives whose six companies work in the energy sector.

The trip was organized by UK Trade & Investment, the British government agency, which assists British companies seeking to expand internationally.

The delegation spent the day touring Seacor Marine, the operator of offshore marine vessels whose main corporate office for the Gulf of Mexico is located in Houma; Gulf Island Fabrication, the Houma-based builder of drilling platforms; Quality Shipyard of Houma; Oil States Industries, the Arlington, Texas-based manufacturer of oilfield products with operations in Houma, and T. Baker Smith, the engineering planning and design firm with headquarters in Houma.

TEDA Marketing & Recruitment Director Michelle Edwards and TEDA CEO Michael Ferdinand led a lunchtime presentation for the British delegation in which they highlighted the Houma area’s strong economic base.

“We have the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway which is a superhighway,” Edwards said. “The Houma Navigation Canal gives us a straight shot to the Gulf.”

Ferdinand pointed out that “Terrebonne” means “good earth” in French. The phrase refers to “the abundance of the land,” he said. “Initially, the area had farming, sugar cane, and trapping. Now, it’s oil and gas.”

He touted the Houma area’s healthcare providers, joking that, “If you have a heart attack in the U.S., you’d want to have it here.”

South Central Industrial Association (SCIA) Executive Director Jane Arnette, speaking about the local educational system, said, “We have a technical college, and a full-scale university 20 minutes away.”

She said that SCIA “wants to assist with providing training. Our organization is directly involved in the training process.”

Edwards focused partly on area economic statistics. “We have an influx of people, employees,” she said. “We have a low unemployment rate of 2.6 percent.

“People are moving here, people like it here,” she said. Excluding Katrina-wracked New Orleans, “Our three-year employment increase is the highest for the state,” including Alexandria and Lake Charles.

“We have a lot of fishing, hunting, ecotourism,” she said. “We have the second largest Mardi Gras in the state.”

Company executives Leland Robichaux of Oil States, Kenny Smith of T. Baker Smith, Gary Hutchinson of Quality Shipyard, Roy Francis of Gulf Island, and Jason Blues of Seacor all talked briefly about their companies to the delegation. Smith is also president of SCIA.

In turn, the members of the delegation made short presentations about the companies they represented. Most of the members emphasized their openness to doing more business in the United States.

John Barron, the managing director of Sureclean, a waste management and industrial cleaning firm based in Alness, Scotland, joked about his company, saying, “We do the horrible things no one else wants to do.

“We invest heavily in the best technology,” he said, more seriously. “We want to see if we can partner with people,” he said. “That’s what we’re here to do, to discuss opportunities.”

Peter Strassheim, business development manager of the Newcastle, England software developer Engica Technology, echoed Barron, saying, “We’re looking for opportunities in America.”

Likewise, Andrew Webb, the general manager of Coates Offshore, an Aberdeen, Scotland company which rents equipment to the oil and gas industry, said, “We’re looking to see how we can stretch ourselves internationally.”

On an information sheet provided by UK Trade & Investment, Coates states that it is “interested in making contact with local service companies… to gain a local presence.”

Joanne Leng, director of international business for the business development organization NOF Energy headquartered in northeastern England, said, “We’re keen to develop partnerships with likeminded developers.”

The NOF Energy’s information sheet states that the company “works to promote UK suppliers to the global energy market.”

In an exchange with Maryanne Tidwell, consul at the British Consulate-General in Houston, SCIA’s Smith said, “The Gulf is on fire again. If you’re unemployed here, you’re chronically unemployed.“The Gulf (of Mexico) is on fire again. If you’re unemployed here, you’re chronically unemployed.”

Later, he said, “There’s a huge contingent of our population ready to retire. There may be a huge void of talented people.”

“I can’t handle the amount of work we have here,” he said. “We have a lack of people.”

After the conference, Alan Stewart, Sureclean’s operations director, struck a similar note.

“It’s a labor thing,” he said. “We can do the training,” but we’re “concerned about getting enough skilled labor.”

Katherine Gilbert, TEDA’s business retention & expansion director, took a more steadfast view.

The conference “is part and parcel of economic development,” she said.

Parish shines to delegates from ‘across the Pond’