PROVIDENCE – Rhode Island’s high-tech exports shrank 13.8 percent in 2008, the second-biggest decline in the nation, as the state’s international trade in computer equipment fell sharply, according to a new study.
Rhode Island exported $220 million worth of high-tech goods last year, down from $255 million in 2007, according to U.S. Census Bureau data analyzed by the TechAmerica Foundation, a nonprofit affiliated with the trade group of the same name.
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Arkansas was the only state that saw high-tech exports decline by a larger percentage than Rhode Island from 2007 to 2008. High-tech trade plummeted 22.1 percent in Arkansas, according to the study. Fourteen states saw high-tech exports decrease.
Massachusetts continued to rank near the top of TechAmerica’s list, with $9.5 billion in total high-tech exports in 2008, up 1 percent from 2007 and fourth most in the nation. California, Texas and Florida ranked ahead of the Bay State.
Nationwide, high-tech exports – the largest merchandise export sector in the U.S. – rose 1 percent to $223 billion in 2008 before falling sharply in the first half of this year, TechAmerica said.
No technology export category in Rhode Island saw growth in 2008. The largest slide was in computer and peripheral equipment, which fell 34 percent to $50 million last year.
Smaller drops were posted in electronic components, the largest category, down 7.2 percent to $64 million; industrial electronics, down 3.4 percent to $56 million; communications equipment, down 20 percent to $20 million; and semiconductors, down 7.7 percent to $12 million.
The high-tech sector made up 11 percent of Rhode Island’s $2 billion in total exports in 2008, the 29th-highest share in the nation, and supported 800 jobs in the state, according to TechAmerica.
Rhode Island’s largest high-tech trading partners in 2008 were Canada, which imported $33 million from the state, and the United Kingdom, which imported $27 million.
Rhode Island’s total annual high-tech exports have fallen by 8 percent since 2002. However, that figure masks large fluctuations, from a high of $299 million in 2003 to a low of $204 million in 2005.
Rhode Island was one of only three states that exported less in high-tech goods in 2008 than it did six years before; the others were Colorado, where exports fell 8.3 percent, and Alabama, where they fell 19.1 percent.
Additional information is available at TechAmerica.org.
