In April I flew into the George Bush International Airport (GBIA) in Houston, Texas.

I was travelling with Steve Dempsey, the president and CEO of the Greater Halifax Partnership, and Nancy Phillips, the organization's director of business development. An Iranian limo driver took us the 39 kilometres to our hotel, where a Sri Lankan clerk checked us in.

We were in town for the Offshore Technology Conference and for meetings of the World Energy Cities Partnership (WECP). While there, we met with Saba Abashawl, an executive with Houston Airport Systems (HAS), the corporation responsible for the GBIA's management. We dined at a seafood restaurant, where Saba told us about her work with the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service and of the relentless flow of international groups seeking to do business in and immigrate to Houston.

Every month nearly 60,000 people relocate to Houston, the fourth largest American city and the fastest growing of the country's 10 largest cities. Most of its 4,000,000 population is not Caucasian. Saba, who is Ethiopian, says the bulk of the population is almost equally divided in three—African-American, Caucasian, and Hispanic—but the rapid growth comes from Asia, the Middle East, and Nigeria.

At the WECP luncheon, Houston Mayor Bill White said that, in the past, oil and gas has been the city's economic driving force and will continue to be, but immigration is the real success story. He explained how today's Houston is multi-national, well-educated, cultured, and not dragged down by age-old ignorance.

You can see evidence of this new attitude everywhere. Anthony Hall, an African-American, is the director of Budget and Administration for Houston and arguably one of the most powerful people in the city. Luis Perez, the director of corporate and public affairs at HAS, told the GHP delegation that it makes economic sense for the airport to hire well-educated bilingual Hispanics in senior-management positions in order to put it at the forefront of Central and South American markets.

So what does all of this mean to those of us on North American's eastern edge? In Atlantic Canada, we have an abysmal record of attracting immigrants. Today efforts are being made by governments and their representatives to improve the situation, which is great, but the most important group hasn't yet entered the game. Our businesses are the main source of opportunity and, therefore, largely responsible for enticing new residents to stay.

We have to figure out how business can play a bigger role. In Houston, the international connections tend to be with like communities: oil and gas-exporting countries; Spanish-speaking countries; places where the population's work ethic is strong. If business helps grow immigration, governments will respond to the economic needs created by the growth.

A burgeoning community of qualified immigrants brings its own opportunities, attracting family members, colleagues, and capital as well as access to global markets. Plus, immigrants bring new values and traditions that become part of the Canadian cultural mosaic.
If this sounds too ideal, just examine the facts: Houston has grown not only physically and economically as a direct result of immigration but also as a centre
of education, culture, technology, life sciences, and engineering. Atlantic Canada can experience this type of growth too. Let's focus on getting our businesses engaged in immigration and in driving our prosperity.