Title II of the Export Enhancement Act of 1992 authorized the creation of an interagency body called the Trade Promotion Coordinating Committee (TPCC) to carry out various duties, including coordinating the export promotion and export financing activities of the U.S. government, ensuring better delivery of services to U.S. businesses, and preventing unnecessary duplication among federal export promotion and export financing programs. The Export Enhancement Act requires this committee to issue an annual report to Congress containing a government-wide strategic plan for federal trade promotion efforts and describing the plan’s implementation. As a result, the TPCC’s National Export Strategy, which articulates U.S. plans to increase exports, is generally issued annually. The President also created the Export Promotion Cabinet and directed it to develop and coordinate the implementation of the NEI, working with the existing TPCC. The Export Promotion Cabinet delivered a September 2010 report to the President with recommendations to implement the goals of the NEI. The report identified several recommendations that support the NEI’s priority of increasing exports by small businesses, including a recommendation to coordinate, expand, and leverage federal outreach resources to identify potential exporters. Some of the approximately 20 TPCC member agencies directly assist small businesses to export overseas, including the SBA, Commerce, Ex- Im, USDA, USTDA, and State. These six agencies are overseen by various congressional committees, including appropriation and authorizing committees (see table 1). In 1993, the TPCC recommended that three agencies—the SBA, Commerce, and Ex-Im—colocate their staff at a domestic network of selected U.S. Export Assistance Centers (USEAC). These “one-stop shops” were to provide coordinated export training, trade leads, export finance, and counseling to U.S. businesses interested in becoming exporters. According to TPCC data, SBA’s funding for export promotion activities has increased substantially in recent years, although SBA’s funding remains a relatively small share of overall federal export promotion funding. For example, TPCC data showed that SBA received about $4 million for export promotion activities in fiscal year 2006 and $5.2 million in fiscal year 2010 and requested $6 million and $6.4 million, respectively, for fiscal years 2011 and 2012. While the fiscal year 2012 request represents an increase of 60 percent from its fiscal year 2006 funding levels, SBA’s funding represents less than 1 percent of the total export promotion funding for the six key agencies that support small business exporting. According to the TPCC, the six key U.S. agencies requested over $1 billion for trade promotion activities in fiscal year 2012, and SBA requested $6.4 million, as shown in table 2. TPCC member agencies may define trade promotion differently. For example, State’s budget includes funding for all State business and economic activities because, according to State, those activities could contribute to enhancing U.S. trade. Conversely, the budget amount for SBA only includes funding for OIT even though other SBA entities, such as the SBDCs, may devote substantial amounts of time to export promotion. Therefore, the reported budget amounts may not always reflect each agency’s total level of activity relating to export promotion or each agency’s actual contribution toward increasing U.S. exports. Furthermore, the export promotion amounts in table 2 do not differentiate activities directed toward small businesses from those directed to larger businesses. All of the agencies other than SBA work with businesses of all sizes, which creates difficulties when making comparisons with SBA about export promotion assistance specifically focused on small businesses. Within SBA, OIT has primary responsibility for export promotion. OIT’s field staff of Export Finance Specialists are colocated with Commerce in 19 USEACs throughout the United States, with one OIT staff per USEAC. OIT field staff engage in a variety of activities but are primarily responsible for providing technical assistance, outreach, and training on SBA’s export finance programs. Separate from OIT, SBDCs are nonfederal partner entities partially funded by SBA that provide a wide range of business services, such as assisting small businesses with financial and marketing advice and tools, primarily through one-on-one counseling services. The over 900 SBDCs are organized into networks under 63 lead centers that largely correspond with state boundaries except in California and Texas, which have multiple lead centers. In addition to providing general business services, SBDCs may also help businesses interested in exporting, particularly those that are new to exporting and need assistance with preparing their business to export. For example, SBDCs may assist a company in developing an international business plan. While most SBDCs provide export assistance as one of many services, SBA has designated some SBDCs as International Trade Centers that focus primarily on exporting. One person in each of SBA’s 68 District Offices is designated as a District International Trade Officer and provides basic export assistance as a collateral duty, but these officers spend most of their time on nonexport- related activities. The District International Trade Officers are managed by a separate SBA office, SBA’s Office of Field Operations, and they are not usually colocated at USEACS. SBA intended that District International Trade Officers only spend about 15 percent of their time on export promotion responsibilities. These responsibilities include organizing and attending outreach events and fielding export-related questions from small businesses directed to the District Office. SBA’s increased activities in promoting small business exports take place within a complex, multiagency environment. The responsibility to provide export assistance to small businesses is shared by six key federal agencies, which engage in four major activities to promote small business exports. The NEI identifies these primary activities for U.S. agencies involved in small business promotion, which we classify under four general terms: Outreach: Identify small businesses that can begin or expand Counseling and Training: Prepare small businesses to export Trade Leads: Connect small businesses to export opportunities Financing: Support small businesses once they have export These activities are dispersed across the six key agencies, as shown in table 3 and explained in further detail below. All six of the key federal agencies and their partner entities that support small business exporting participate in outreach and education to help prepare small businesses to export successfully. Additionally, each agency and partner entity engages in at least one other primary activity to assist small businesses with exporting. In addition to conducting outreach, SBA provides counseling and training, primarily through SBDCs, and assists small businesses with export financing through OIT. All six of the federal agencies that support small business exports conduct outreach, which can include any activity in which agencies seek to inform small businesses or other partners, such as lenders, about the export promotion services offered by the federal government. For this reason, outreach can be difficult to separate from other activities that are part of the agencies’ export promotion effort. For example, a Commerce trade specialist could attend a trade show to meet with and counsel a number of existing clients, but there she would also have the opportunity to meet with small businesses to identify potential clients interested in exporting. As another example, seminars and training sessions, which may be useful for existing exporters or other clients seeking to improve their operations, can also serve an outreach function because they often help introduce small businesses to exporting and help them identify whether they are ready to begin exporting. Another important outreach tool for export assistance agencies is the Export.gov portal. Designed as a “one-stop shop” for companies interested in exporting, Export.gov provides content from multiple TPCC agencies in a single website. In September 2010, Commerce, working with other agencies, revamped the portal to include two new service channels, named “Begin Exporting” and “Expand Your Exports,” that are designed to provide tailored information based on whether or not a company currently exports. Companies can use Export.gov to find webinars or in-person training or to find local resources that can help with export counseling or financing. Commerce intends to roll out a new version of Export.gov that allows for more tailored targeting of information in January 2013. SBA (through SBDCs), Commerce, and USDA all provide one-on-one counseling services to small businesses. Counseling is specific to the needs of each business and can cover a variety of topics relating to international trade and exporting, such as helping a business identify a target export market or discussing logistics for shipping exported goods. USDA’s services, many of which are delivered through nonfederal partner entities called State Regional Trade Groups, are targeted specifically at businesses that export agricultural products.SBDCs offer counseling to businesses of all types. As we have previously reported, export promotion counseling is often labor intensive and time consuming because agency staff must spend a significant amount of time working with a company before it is able to successfully export. company for exporting if it has never exported before. According to Commerce estimates, it can take 2 years or more from the time a company new to exporting begins to receive assistance until that business can make a successful export sale. Even companies with experience exporting may require over a year of preparation before being able to expand into a new market. GAO, National Export Initiative: U.S. and Foreign Commercial Service Should Improve Performance and Resource Allocation Management, GAO-11-909 (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 29, 2011). needs. For example, Commerce officials noted that Portland’s SBDC offers intensive export training through a 10-session course that takes place over 10 months. On the other hand, Commerce and the area’s District Export Council offer an Export University course that is specifically designed as a 1-day course. While SBA typically does not provide much assistance with trade leads— connecting small businesses with overseas buyers—a few of the SBDC counselors we met with said they sometimes try to help clients identify specific opportunities with overseas partners.