By Anita French
THE MORNING NEWS  - June 29, 2007

ROGERS -- Northwest Arkansas is losing its identity as a rural backwater as it rapidly becomes a more global village, according to several local officials who spoke Thursday at the John Q. Hammons Center in Rogers.
     The occasion was an international forum hosted by the Bentonville-Bella Vista Chamber of Commerce as part of its Champion University series held for local businesses.
Speaking Thursday were representatives from the Arkansas World Trade Center, the Korean Trade Commission, Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Mercy Health System of Northwest Arkansas and Cameron Smith Associates, an executive recruiting firm in Rogers.
     Cameron Smith recently returned from a trip to China, where he and his team held a three-day conference to help Chinese manufacturers learn how to do business directly with Wal-Mart.
     The Bentonville-based company reportedly imports $27 billion in products from China yearly.
Smith said his company is continuing the process of helping some of those manufacturers set up offices in Northwest Arkansas. If they do, they will join the 1,218 Wal-Mart suppliers already here, he said.
     Northwest Arkansas's growth is helping to dispel the image of its being a backward rural area among companies worldwide, according to Smith, many of whom are now clamoring to open offices here, he said.
     Supplier teams have doubled in size just since 2004, and now more than 5,000 people work for Wal-Mart suppliers in Northwest Arkansas, Smith said. What's more, there are 300 companies that are "vendors to the vendors" also doing business here, he said.
     There has been a steady growth in that number despite the consolidation of some suppliers, such as Procter & Gamble buying Gillette, Smith said.
     Dan Hendrix, who heads the Arkansas World Trade Center, accompanied Smith on his China trip. He said later that part of the Trade Center's mission was to attract foreign investment.
     Denise Thomas stood in for Hendrix at Thursday's meeting. She said the Arkansas World Trade Center's goals are to help eliminate trade barriers, further the scope of Arkansas businesses and expand global services.
     Thomas called the Trade Center a "gateway to the global marketplace," noting that it has held seminars in South Korea and other foreign nations and hosted a visit from the ambassador of Nicaragua.
     The Arkansas World Trade Center opened in January at Pinnacle Hills in Rogers.
     Ed Clifford, president of the Bentonville-Bella Vista Chamber of Commerce, said he has been working closely with D.Y. Kim of the Korean Trade Commission in Dallas on getting Korean manufacturers to open offices in Northwest Arkansas.
     There has been an "amazing change" in Korea since he first visited there in the 1980s, Clifford said. The business climate is thriving, but getting manufacturers to open offices in Northwest      Arkansas will not happen overnight, he said.
     Still, there is a steady movement towards becoming global that "will change everything in Northwest Arkansas forever," Clifford said.
     Susan Barrett, CEO of Mercy Health System of Northwest Arkansas, said residents may have seen that change already under way as they watch pastures with cows roaming over them slowly being replaced by development.
     "We need to embrace that (change)," she said.
     Barrett continued the global drum beat by saying that even Mercy Health System recognizes its role in Northwest Arkansas becoming an international community by opening its new $40 million "destination" hospital along Interstate 540 in Rogers this fall.
     Barrett said $31 million has been raised so far in the fund-raising campaign, and she made a soft pitch to the Wal-Mart suppliers at Thursday's meeting to help bridge that financial gap.