According to a report this week by Arkansas Business (Little Rock, Ark., USA) Mark Hamer didn’t realize serendipity was on the breakfast menu at the Ross Bridge Resort on Aug. 27, 2010.

Two months into his new job as director of business development in Asia for the Arkansas Economic Development Commission, Hamer was looking to mingle with prospects at the four-day Southern Governors’ Association meeting in Hoover, Ala.

That’s when he noticed a Chinese gentleman and a young lady seated at a large table and strode over to ask if he could join them. With Hamer making it a party of three, the morning meal was about to transform into a momentous occasion. Hamer soon discovered that his dining companions were Hongxin Li (photo right), chairman of Shandong Sun Paper Industry JSC, and his daughter, Lina Li. The industrial recruiter looking to make new commercial friendships had just sat down in very good company.

"He’s so unassuming that I didn’t know I was sitting next to someone who heads up a multibillion-dollar corporation," Hamer said. The ensuing introductions and small talk that morning began a meandering journey that culminated in a billion-dollar industrial announcement for Clark County in April of this year.

"He said he was looking for pine trees, and I said ‘You’re talking with the right person because we have a lot of those in Arkansas,’" Hamer said. "You can’t make this up."

The conversation marked the start of a Sino-Arkansas courtship that spanned more than five years, three AEDC executive directors, two governors’ administrations, and thousands of transglobal air miles. (See Shandong Sun Paper Project Timeline.)

The future pulp mill site, five miles south of Arkadelphia, Ark., represents Shandong Sun Paper’s first North American project. Construction of the complex is expected to begin a year from now and produce 250 new jobs to staff it when fully operational in 2020.

"The key is starting a relationship and building trust," Hamer said. "That breakfast in Alabama was the start. It took a team, a whole lot of people to bring this to fruition."

Bill Wright, chairman of the Arkadelphia Regional Economic Alliance, was among those helping make the international pulp mill development happen.

Assembling the 1,054-acre site on the outskirts of Gum Springs involved 16 property owners, he said. Putting together the acreage entailed deals totaling more than $5 million. Only 50 acres of the site was listed for sale by one owner, but others graciously consented to sell if it would mean landing the pulp mill project, Wright said.

"They agreed to do it for the people, for the county," he said. "They agreed to give up something they were going to leave to their kids."

Wright entered the picture in the spring of 2011 during Shandong Sun Paper’s first AEDC-sponsored visit to Arkansas.

Company officials looked at several sites in the Arkadelphia area and learned about the Ouachita River, the rail and road network, and the local universities: Ouachita Baptist and Henderson State.

The Clark County entourage questioned company officials about the impact their proposed plant would have on air and water quality.

"We talked with them about the importance of having clean industry," Wright said. "They assured me that the processes and technology they use are vastly improved over the plants we’re used to in the U.S. We shook hands with them, and I thought I would never see them again."

But he did, 18 months later, and the rest became history...