Though the economy at the local, state and national levels continues to shed manufacturing jobs, area tooling and machining representatives remain optimistic about the industry’s future.

“Our membership is fairly diverse,” said Scott Hanaway, president of the northwestern Pennsylvania chapter of the National Tooling and Machin-ing Association, a trade group for the industry. “It depends on the types of end-products made. Some are growing pretty strong right now.”

Shops that have survived have done it by investing in new technologies that allow for increases in productivity with fewer workers, Hanaway said.

Most of the county’s manufacturing jobs are in the tooling and machining industry, supplying equipment and parts to major manufacturers.

Manufacturing is important to Crawford County since there is a heavier reliance on it here than in other parts of Pennsylvania and the country. About 20 percent of the jobs in the county are related to manufacturing, compared to 12 percent for the state and 11 percent nationally.

However, statistics show manufacturing jobs continuing to fall across the board.

Crawford County had 7,700 manufacturing jobs in July 2007, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry. That’s down some 300 from the 8,000 recorded in July 2006.

Pennsylvania had 660,900 manufacturing jobs in July 2007 — down 12,800 from July 2006, according to the state’s Department of Labor and Industry.

Nationally, there were 14,054,000 manufacturing jobs in July, down 175,000 from the 14,299,000 in July 2006, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Despite all the losses, seasonally adjust unemployment rates locally, at the state level and nationally remain below 5 percent — a jobless rate that economists say indicates full employment since there are always some workers in transition.

Crawford County’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 4.8 percent for July while Pennsylvania’s rate was 4.3 percent and it was 4.6 percent for the nation.

Scott Meckley, a state labor analyst, said last week the decline in manufacturing jobs is just slowly continuing.

“We’re not showing gains in manufacturing across the state,” he said. “There are productivity increases and technology increases, but (it is done) with fewer employees.”

Hanaway said there is business for area tooling and machining firms, citing those tooling firms supplying parts to the aerospace, mining equipment, agriculture equipment and oil field service industries as doing well.

“There is business out there,” Hanaway said. “We’re also seeing business coming back (from U.S. firms that sent work to China).”