News Listing

Alejandra Y. Castillo is the Assistant Secretary of Commerce. As the head of EDA, she is responsible for fulfilling the bureau’s mission of leading the federal economic development agenda. As part of this, she is working to promote economic development in those communities traditionally underserved, including Tribal nations.

Through President Biden’s American Rescue Plan, the Economic Development Administration awarded more than $540 million to support Indigenous communities — including federally recognized Tribes, Alaskan Native Villages, and public and private sector organizations serving Native Pacific Islanders — as they rebuild and recover from the economic impacts of the coronavirus pandemic.

November is National Entrepreneurship Month, and we celebrate all American entrepreneurs as we reflect on how we support and enable entrepreneurship. As technology innovators and entrepreneurs face their unique challenges and opportunities, EDA and the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship (OIE) are committed to learning from the entrepreneurial experience and to continue to evolve our program design and delivery to accelerate technologies as entrepreneurs take them from the lab, to the marketplace, and into our lives.

This week, the U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA), in partnership with the Argonne National Laboratory, announces the launch of the Economic Development Capacity Index (EDCI), a web-based, publicly accessible dashboard designed to assist economic development practitioners in answering the question: “How did an individual community’s capacities change over time due to EDA support?”

Over the last 18 months, the U.S. government has relentlessly focused on an industrial strategy designed to revitalize the nation’s manufacturing base, strengthen critical supply chains, and position U.S. workers and businesses to lead and compete globally. The Economic Development Administration (EDA) is a linchpin of the government-wide effort to invigorate and sustain a historic recovery in domestic manufacturing, committing a major portion of its $3 billion American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding toward catalyzing projects and initiatives leading to good-paying, manufacturing jobs.

President Biden’s American Rescue Plan (ARPA) allocated the Economic Development Administration (EDA) $3 billion in supplemental funding. This investment is assisting communities nationwide in their efforts to recover from the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic by accelerating the process of economic recovery and by improving the resiliency of local economies to future economic challenges.

On September 2, 2022, President Joe Biden announced the 21 winners of EDA’s $1 billion Build Back Better Regional Challenge. It was the culmination of more than a year’s work, which began with 529 applications from all across the country.

The Economic Development Administration (EDA) recognizes the need for more resources to improve technical assistance and capacity building in underserved populations and communities’ representation in local economic development. Therefore, last year, we elevated ‘equity’ as our top investment priority.