By 2015, Utah will be one of the top 10 states in bouncing back from the downturn in terms of new-job creation, an economic forecasting company said Tuesday.

IHS Global Insight, a Boston-based company that has 25 offices in 14 countries, projected Utah's average annual employment growth rate will be 1.62 percent, ninth highest in the United States.

Mohammad-Qamar Siddiqui, a regional economist with the firm, said the state's strong employment position before the recession kept it from being affected as severely as many other states.

And as the economy slowly recovers, Siddiqui figures Utah's foundation of biomedical, electronic and health care industries "will play a leading role in the growth."

"Utah looks good in a number of sectors," he added, predicting construction, transportation and housing will "come back." Professional and business services will, too, as companies add administrative support for new projects.

Mark Knold, chief economist with the Utah Department of Workforce Services, has no trouble with IHS's projection. But he attributes the recovery primarily to another cause -- population growth.

"That's the springboard that will make Utah come back better than many places," he said. "We're growing our population even with the recession, and population growth drives economic growth. Economic growth can be stifled for short amounts of time, even a few years, but with that population growth you have pent-up demand that has to be released, and employment springs back to life."

Spencer Eccles, executive director of the Governor's Office of Economic Development, thinks Global Insight's conclusion reflects Utah's "visionary and fiscally sound leadership. ... With the most educated, productive and youngest workforce in the nation, Utah is pleased to be recognized as one of those states that will lead this recovery."

Various factors drove projected rebounds in states that led IHS's rankings, Siddiqui said.

Idaho had the highest projected employment increase, 2.01 percent. Siddiqui said its pre-recession growth and the relatively low cost of doing business there -- and in Utah -- will sustain the recovery.

"People moved into Idaho to establish businesses when California became too expensive," he said. "The cost of doing business there was attractive. Idaho and Utah both benefited from that dynamic."

Elsewhere, Siddiqui noted, Texas has a diversified economy, Florida's high level of in-migration continues to bring money into the state and Virginia has a strong high-tech component of its economy.

Although better than most states, Utah's projected employment growth rate still pales compared with what it was before the 2008 crash -- 4.2 percent in 2005, 3 percent in 2006 and 2.7 percent in 2007. Even as the recession took force in 2008, Utah had a job growth rate of 0.2 percent.

"That's a very small number, but positive," Siddiqui said. "Many states at that point were experiencing negative growth."

IHS Global Insight was created in 2001 from the merger of two firms -- Data Resources, Inc. and Wharton Econometric Forecasting Associates -- that date to the mid-1960s.

It provides economic, financial and political information to support decision-making at 3,800 private sector and government clients. With 700 employees, its revenues exceeded $100 million last year.

mikeg@sltrib.com