Plan to grow Mississippi’s defense economy released

The Governor’s Office of Military Affairs (GOMA) and the Mississippi Defense Initiative (MDI) at the University of Southern Mississippi have announced plans to strengthen and grow Mississippi’s defense economy in the recently released The Future Fight: Mississippi’s Defense Economy Strategic Plan.

The plan was developed to capitalize on trends in national defense and the security arena and presents an economic and community development approach to growing the defense industry and strengthening defense communities. Partners around the state have already begun implementing plans that will foster more cooperation in defense-focused communities and aid in capturing more defense projects.

“Mississippi is proud to be a leader in the defense industry,” said Gov. Tate Reeves. “This new strategic plan is about laying the foundation for our state to compete for new and relevant defense investment. We want our research centers to develop military technologies, our manufacturing sector to produce them, and our military installations to deploy them. Mississippi and our economic engine stand ready to support our military in any way we can.”

The strategy was primarily authored by GOMA and MDI; however, stakeholders from across academia; local, state and federal government, defense-related industries; all branches of the military; and others assisted with shaping and focusing the effort and will add to the success of the plan moving forward.

The Future Fight has three significant areas of recommendations to improve the state’s approach to the defense industry. Under the plan, the state will continue to build up communities with military installations, market the state to defense-related industries and focus on systems that encourage veteran employment.

To view the plan, visit: https://mississippi.org/wp-content/uploads/USM-11667-MDI-Strategic-Plan-Final-9-29.pdf