By Dan McCue
Staff Writer

“Oh, to be 45 rather than 65 today,” said Dean, owner of Dean’s LTD, an Orangeburg haberdashery that specializes in men’s and big and tall fashions and does a brisk business in tuxedo rentals and choir robes. “I’d probably be investing in some local real estate right about now.”

What Dean and many others are anticipating is the arrival of Jafza International’s planned investment of $600 million in the area to develop a logistics, distribution and light manufacturing complex on 1,300 acres at the crossroads of U.S. Highway 301 and Interstate 95. The development is expected to employ up to 10,000 when completed.

Those are the nuts-and-bolts of the project, but businesses and community leaders who have stayed the course in Orangeburg for years feel Jafza represents the rebirth of opportunity.

“We always envisioned this would happen, that what we’ve long called the global logistics triangle would be an entry point, a hub, for the movement of goods from the region’s ports to the marketplace, but it has become something more than that,” said Gregg Robinson, executive director of the Orangeburg County Development Commission.

“With the kind of players we see coming into the market now, we’re starting to see tremendous opportunities and development looming on the horizon. By focusing on the development of logistic centers and commerce parks, we’ve developed the infrastructure for the creation of widespread and diverse opportunity.”

As more local payroll is created through distribution, warehousing and manufacturing, the more discretionary income will be infused into the local economy. And that will lure more service businesses to the area, enhancing the housing market, enhancing the local school systems and raising the bar of everything else along with it, Robinson said.

Orangeburg’s transformation
The “big bang” of Orangeburg’s transfor-mation is the arrival of Jafza, a subsidiary of Dubai World, a holding company owned by the royal family of Dubai.

The company was drawn to the Southeast by demographic and cargo shipping trends. And in October it completed the purchase of 1,324 acres in Orangeburg County.

Jafza officials estimate that it will take 20 years to complete their logistics and manufacturing center, which is projected to employ between 8,000 and 10,000 people.

But even in the near term, raising the development from a vast expanse of sod fields will create hundreds, if not thousands, of construction jobs.