A new era of dramatic global change, not seen at this magnitude since the Industrial Revolution, has resulted in new opportunities and challenges for the Memphis region. Responding to these opportunities requires a fresh understanding of the world and the region. This new way of viewing and recognizing the region within the context of global change can be referred to as a new conceptual framework. 

Traditional boundaries fragment the region
Fragmentation is the biggest single issue facing regions in the global competition for economic growth and improved quality of life. The Memphis region is a large collection of governmental, business, and institutional units spread across an expansive landscape. The region operates within a traditional conceptual framework (or mindset), created by a variety of natural and man-made boundaries that fragment the region's public, private, and institutional sectors. Due to the region's many boundaries, the individual units of government, business, and institutions view themselves as separate entities and operate independently of one another. This regional fragmentation becomes a barrier to developing the kinds of synergies necessary to forge the links among various units and provide the platform for a coordinated response to new opportunities, shared relationships, common goals, or an understanding of the regional impacts of planning and investments. 

Creating a cohesive and coordinated framework
In the vastly increased size of the global marketplace, small fragmented units cannot effectively compete. Mergers, new partnerships, and alliances are required to form larger, more competitive units. Meeting the demands of the globalized world and maximizing the region's potential in that world will require moving beyond traditional boundaries, establishing new regional relationships, and creating a new level of coordination among the various units within the public, private, and institutional sectors. Creating a new framework based on a "concept" of the region is one of the basic tools for building the spirit of regional cooperation. This new framework facilitates an understanding of the emerging patterns of functional connections and flows across traditional boundary lines. It becomes the common denominator necessary for the three sectors, each with a different set of values, functions, responsibilities, and boundaries to share a vision for the region's future. Understanding the pattern of linkage is new and provides the means of coordinating the available resources to strengthen the region's competitiveness. 

Competing as one region
As the 21st century unfolds, competitive pressures in the new globalized economy will accelerate. The ability of public, private and institutional sectors to work together effectively on regional initiatives is the vital ingredient for the region's economic survival. Recognizing that all the various units in the region are parts of a larger regional whole and together form one competitive unit in the global economy is the foundation for improving the region's economy and quality of life. Realizing that the region is one functional unit versus a collection of separate (and often competing) entities provides the platform for regional leadership and citizens should work as partners, maximizing the potential for the future of the Memphis region. 

The region has the framework of institutional resources for building a "New Economy."
The Memphis region benefits from having three major state universities to provide the foundation for higher education and research. The three largest universities are: Arkansas State University, the University of Mississippi and the University of Memphis. In addition, the University of Tennessee Health Science Center (UTHSC), St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, and the region's medical centers provide the necessary research and training to build and support "new" economic activity in the bio-med health sciences field. Together these institutions enable business incubation and startups to be facilitated. An example is the TriStar incubator, a private research facility created by UTHSC. These institutions working collaboratively along with community college workforce training programs help prepare the region for new economic activity.

A Transcontinental Hub Serving World Markets

A new global opportunity for the Memphis Region
The location and air and water resources of the Memphis region position it to become one of the most important regions in the 21st century.

The new global geography
New opportunities emerged for the Memphis region during the 1990s when the collapse of the Soviet Union initiated a process of global economic integration and a restructuring of the global economic geography. A world that was divided by ideological blocs for most of the 20th century has become one global unit defined by a single continuous global network, a set of new trading blocs, and a series of regions which function as the foundation blocs of the global economy and the hubs of the global network. The Memphis region, which had established itself as a major "Free World" logistics center, began evolving as a key global connection point in the significantly expanded and integrated global marketplace.

It is essential for every constituency to understand that at moments of shift in the global network, regions are either rapidly propelled forward or left behind as a new stage in the development of the global economy and network emerges. None of the individual cities, towns, or counties in the three-state region can effectively compete in the vastly increased size of an integrated world economy. Only the Memphis region taken as a whole with its combined human, economic and institutional resources can emerge as a significant region in the global network.

The importance of the North American trading bloc to the Memphis region
For the first time in history, the three nations of North America are joining together in a free trade agreement to form a single "North American Trading Bloc." The North American Trading Bloc will form a larger domestic marketplace with a combined population exceeding 400 million. Since Mexico has a population four times that of Canada, continental integration has produced a new continental demographic center, which is further west and south of the traditional U.S. center. This new center can benefit the Memphis region because it is now closer to the demographic center of the North American continent and thereby has better access to the entire continental marketplace.

As a result, a new vertical industrial axis (the NAFTA corridor) connecting the three countries is being developed and will pass directly through Memphis. By connecting to the NAFTA corridor, the Memphis region will significantly strengthen its already important place in the east-west and north-south U.S. national linkage pattern and potentially become a powerful continental hub connecting North America to the world marketplace. 

The new global competition for the Memphis region 
The principal competition, within the new economic geography, will be among regions dispersed around the world. As a result, the competition for jobs, people, and institutional resources is intensifying among the world's regions. Several of the world's largest regions now top 20 million people and those with a population under one million find it difficult to register in the world marketplace. While the Memphis region has the size, resources, and opportunity to become a significant competitor in the new global economy, this can only be achieved by the three states in the region working effectively together to build itself into a cohesive competitive unit.

As the 21st century opens, it offers the Memphis region the possibility of a new era of economic opportunity.
Global and continental integration is changing the context of the Delta. Becoming strongly linked to the world economy, the Delta has some of the nation's largest corporations, the world's largest cargo airport, fine universities, and many important environmental, historic, and cultural resources with which to reestablish itself as a powerful and important economic region. The Memphis region serves as a key junction in the continental grid and anchor point at the north end of the Delta.

The changing context of Mississippi Delta
A region of strong contrasts, the Mississippi Delta is one of America's most distinctive regions. The Mississippi River forms the backbone of the region and is the primary dividing line of the North American continent. The principal cities of the Delta developed at key junction points along the Mississippi, as the sheer size of the river limits the number of crossing points. Memphis grew during the 19th century to become one of the nation's largest and best known cities, while the Delta around it became a wealthy region with a distinctive and unique culture strongly reflected in the arts of architecture, literature, painting, and especially music. However, during the 20th century, the Delta was largely bypassed by major economic trends. The industrial economy developed to the north of the Delta along the Great Lakes, while in the later half of the century the "new" or high-tech economy developed primarily along the Pacific and Atlantic coasts. 

The five scales of reference
Five scales of reference are necessary to understand the relationship of the Memphis region to the global economy. Recognizing the importance of different sets of issues and competitive relationships in each of these geographical contexts, or scales of reference, is fundamental to understanding the relationship of the Memphis region to the global economy.

1. Global: 
The integration of the global economy and the development of an increasingly seamless global network have altered the context of the Memphis region. Understanding the implications and opportunities of its location at an important crossroads in this network provides the basic reference for the region.

2. North America or Continental Grid: 
The divisions in the world's economic geography are no longer ideological blocs and national states but a series of functionally integrated trading blocs. As a result of the NAFTA treaties, the Memphis region now occupies an important position in the newly created North America trading bloc.

3.Super Region:
The Memphis super region is the area defined by the surrounding ring of similarly sized regions including Little Rock; Jackson, Mississippi; Birmingham; Huntsville-Decatur; Nashville; and Springfield, Missouri. These regions are located within a range of approximately 150 to 200 miles of Memphis and influence the market area and define the boundaries of the Memphis region. 

4. The Memphis region:
The region covers a market area of more than two million people functionally linked by economic and services activities to the metro core. A ring of ten urban centers stretches 60 to 100 miles from Memphis and defines the functional edge of the Memphis region, including Jonesboro, Blytheville, Jackson, Tupelo and Clarksdale. Within the region are many other urban centers including Oxford, Forrest City, Holly Springs, Tunica and Helena.


5.The Memphis Metro area:
The three-state Memphis metropolitan, or "metro," area is composed of many cities located on both sides of the Mississippi River with a collective population of more than one million. The continuously urbanized metro area extends across the five counties of Crittenden, DeSoto, Fayette, Shelby and Tipton.


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