For the third consecutive year, Alabama is among the top five states in the nation for doing business, according to the fall 2012 edition of Area Development Magazine.

Alabama’s overall business environment, including the cost of doing business, corporate tax environment, incentives programs, and cooperative state government were also cited among the top five by the responding consultants; and its certified sites and competitive utility rates placed in the top five among the states as well.

“As I speak with companies all across the country and all across the world, they tell me they like Alabama because we offer so much,” Governor Robert Bentley said. “We have an environment that really makes companies want to locate and expand here. We offer the best workforce you can find, and we have a world-class workforce training program that helps companies succeed. Over the last 21 months, we’ve announced more than 26,000 new jobs from companies that are locating here or expanding here. Job creation remains my number-one priority, and we stand ready to welcome additional business here in Alabama.”

Alabama House Speaker Mike Hubbard quickly tweeted about the ranking and pledged to keep pushing the state toward the top of the list:

Alabama ranked as fourth best state to do business. No rest until we’re #1. bizjournals.com/birmingham/new… (via @bhambizjrnl) #alpolitics

— Mike Hubbard (@SpeakerHubbard) October 18, 2012

“We are proud that Alabama has once again received recognition for its business friendly environment,” Speaker Hubbard told Yellowhammer. “The Republican Legislative Majority has made job creation its number one priority for the last two years by passing legislation to incentivize new industries to locate in our state, preventing frivolous lawsuits, and keeping taxes down on current businesses. These and other pro-business pieces of legislation have helped to put Alabama on the economic development map across the globe and have kept Alabama’s home-grown businesses strong.”

The report also listed Alabama first for competitive labor costs and near the top of the list for workforce development programs.

“Alabama consistently ranks as a great place to do business because we have forged unique partnerships that give the state advantages,” Commerce Secretary Greg Canfield said. “Not only are we competing, but in many cases, we are winning major projects with worldwide name recognition. The state is poised to be third-largest automotive producer in the nation and will soon be part of a major aerospace corridor.”

This summer Airbus announced it would locate a $600 million, 1,000-job assembly operation in Mobile to build the A320 commercial aircraft. This new facility will place Airbus in the middle of the Gulf Coast aerospace cluster.

A link to the full report can be found here.