Maria Isabel Ellis Champions Oregon’s Exports. She Has Her Work Cut Out for Her.

A small silver lining? Expect a blueberry glut.

An empty Portland International Airport. (Rocky Burnside)
By Mark Zusman
WW presents “Distant Voices,” a daily video interview for the era of social distancing. Our reporters are asking Portlanders what they’re doing during quarantine.

This is a rough time to get into the import/export business.

About 20 percent of Oregon's jobs and economy are pegged to international trade. That means Maria Isabel Ellis has a whale of a job ahead of her for the next 18 months.

Ellis is executive director of the Pacific Northwest International Trade Association. She recently moved back to Portland from her native Colombia with a mandate to advance more trade from the Pacific Northwest to the rest of the world.

That won't be easy. The COVID-related shock to the global apparatus of trade hits Oregon particularly hard, Ellis points out, because our state relies on jobs and commerce by dealing with other nations far more than most others.

While Intel and Nike are the big dogs when it comes to trade overseas, Ellis points out that huge pieces of this state's economy that fall into other buckets also depend on trade. That portends a deeper plunge for our economy over the next several years.

A small silver lining? Expect a blueberry glut.

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