Today the White House announced steps to boost rural economies while promoting job creation.

Here are the highlights of the “We Can’t Wait” efforts discussed:

• Promoting A Bioeconomy: President Obama issued a Presidential Memorandum today directing the Federal Government to take decisive steps to dramatically increase the purchase of biobased products over the next two years, which will create jobs and drive innovation where biobased products are grown and manufactured. The Memorandum will also result in a 50 percent increase in the number of new products that are designated as biobased. Biobased products include items like paints, soaps and detergents and are developed from farm grown plants, rather than chemicals or petroleum bases. The biobased products sector marries the two most important economic engines for rural America: agriculture and manufacturing.
• Rural Jobs Accelerator: The Rural Jobs Accelerator is a national competition that will provide about $15 million for projects that promote innovation-fueled regional job creation. The competition will combine funding from the USDA, the Economic Development Administration (EDA), Delta Regional Authority and the Appalachian Regional Commission. Additionally, this approach will require multiple agencies to coordinate technical assistance and grant / loan programs so that potential rural customers have a single access point within the Federal government to mobilize the resources of the government to help a region of the country. USDA will utilize the Rural Community Development Initiative (RCDI) program to support this effort and provide technical assistance and training funds to qualified intermediary organizations to develop their capacity to undertake housing, community facilities, and community and economic development projects in rural areas. The Federal Funding Opportunity will be released in the next few weeks.
• Rural Health IT Workforce: The Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Labor signed a memorandum of understanding to connect community colleges and technical colleges that support rural communities with the materials and resources they need to support the training of Health Information Technology (HIT) professionals that work in rural hospitals and clinics. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that the needed HIT workforce will increase by 20 percent by 2016.

Seems like Health IT is a major focus:

“Health information technology has the potential to improve the quality, access, and efficiency of health care delivery, especially in our nation’s rural areas. To achieve this aim, it is essential that we have a skilled health IT workforce,” said Mary Wakefield, PhD., R.N., Administrator of the Health Resources and Services Administration. “This memorandum of understanding with our colleagues at the Department of Labor will build on existing collaborations to help ease the challenges of geographic isolation and staff shortages faced by rural communities and help move us toward our mutual goal of Health IT workforce development.”

“There is a real need to expand the rural health IT workforce and our MOU with the Department of Health and Human Services will help ensure that job training programs are quickly and effectively addressing this need,” said Assistant Secretary for Employment and Training Administration Jane Oates.

You can only hope that someone in Frankfort has enough sense to make sure these federal efforts benefit Kentucky.