Rhonda Keenum was confirmed in April as Assistant Secretary for Trade Promotion and Director General of the U.S. Commercial Service at the U.S. Department of Commerce. The Commercial Service is the federal government's key export promotion agency. Its mission is to help small and medium-sized American businesses export and to advocate for U.S. business interests abroad. Prior to her nomination, Keenum served as a senior vice-president at Edelman Worldwide in Washington D.C., an international public relations firm.

How would you characterize the mission of the Commercial Service?
     Client focused. We want to increase the number of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that are exporting. Our message is this: We want to tell every current or potential exporter that the Commercial Service can help them manage risk and go further in the global marketplace then they might have ever imagined.

Why should companies consider exporting if they aren't already?
     Ninety-five percent of the world's consumers live outside of the United States, so there's great potential. Exporting can be vital to a company's bottom line. The world economy is growing and U.S. exports are rebounding, so it's a good time to export.

You mentioned smaller businesses. What is their export potential?
     It's tremendous - 97 percent of U.S. exporters are SMEs, but as a group account for about 30 percent of total value of U.S. exports of goods. They often aren't aware of the full benefits of exporting or think it's too burdensome. Our job is to introduce SMEs to the international marketplace.

What do you hope to achieve in your new position?
     Harnessing the full export potential of SMEs, including women- and minority-owned firms. We want to help U.S. companies take advantage of our free-trade agreements, which have reduced trade barriers and made it easier to export to markets such as Singapore, Chile, Canada, Mexico, Israel and Jordan. Free-trade negotiations have also been completed with a number of other countries, and we will work to familiarize companies with these new agreements when they come into force. There are also tremendous export opportunities in the newly expanded European Union.

How can a U.S. company get export assistance?
     We have a worldwide network of 1,700 trade specialists in 107 domestic export assistance centers and 150 posts in 78 countries. Our expertise includes specialized business counseling, trade events and missions, pre-arranged business appointments, matchmaking, the latest economic and business information, advocacy, and others.

Companies can reach us at www.export.gov/cs or by calling 1-800-USA-TRADE.