Blue Book of Urban Competitiveness: Hong Kong, Shenzhen and Shanghai Have Highest Comprehensive Economic Competitiveness

Comprehensive economic competitiveness: Hong Kong, Shenzhen and Shanghai rank top three, and central and west cities are generally lagged behind

The report named as “Blue Book of China’s Urban Competitiveness 2013: New Benchmark: Constructing the Ideal City with Sustainable Competitiveness” firstly made empirical research on the comprehensive competitiveness of 293 cities and the sustainable comparativeness of 287 cities from China mainland, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan in 2012 with the objective data of the whole city.

The Blue Book of Urban Competitiveness points out that the comprehensive economic competitiveness index was composed of economic increment index and efficiency competitiveness index. Top ten cities with the highest comprehensive economic competitiveness index in 2012 orderly included: Hong Kong, Shenzhen, Shanghai, Taipei, Guangzhou, Beijing, Suzhou, Foshan, Tianjin and Macau, wherein 3 of them were from the Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan regions, 3 of them were from southeast coastal cities and 2 of them were from the Circum-Bohai Sea Region, and none of them was from the central and west regions; among the cities in the central and west regions, only Wuhan and Chengdu ranked top 20, while Xi’an which ranked the first among the cities in the northwest region only ranked 36. Obviously, the influence of regional advantages on the urban comprehensive economic competitiveness is significant. From the perspective of the administrative level of the cities, the comprehensive economic competitiveness of special administrative regions, municipalities directly under the central government, deputy provincial cities, cities specifically designated in the state plan and provincial capitals is obviously higher than that of other prefecture-level cities.

The Blue Book also ranks the sustainable competitiveness of the cities. Top ten cities with the highest sustainable competitiveness index in 2012 orderly included: Hong Kong, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Beijing, Guangzhou, Macau, Hangzhou, Qingdao, Wuxi and Jinan. Just like the comprehensive economic competitiveness, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan regions, the southeast region and the Circum-Bohai Sea Region were still the biggest winners.

Livable city competitiveness: Hong Kong and Macau rank forefront, and the overall competitiveness of the west region is low

The Blue Book of Urban Competitiveness points out that ten cities, namely Hong Kong, Macau, Wuxi, Changzhou, Zhuhai, Suzhou, Weihai, Haikou, Zhenjiang and Zhongshan had the highest livable city competitiveness, and became the national top 10 livable cities of the year; Heihe, Jiamusi, Shangqiu, Qingyang, Tianshui, Yinchun, Suihua, Zhaotong, Dingxi and Longnan had the lowest livable city competitiveness, and became the national last 10 livable cities of the year.

According to the Blue Book, in order to better observe the regional difference of the livable competitiveness level of the cities, it further classifies the cities at five livable competitiveness levels by the region. From the regional distribution of the cities we can see that among the top 48 cities except Hong Kong and Macau, 28 cities are from the southeast region, and 10 and 6 are respectively from the Circum-Bohai Sea Region and the central region, and fewer than 3 are respectively from the northeast, northwest and southwest regions, and cities with the highest livable competitiveness have an absolute concentration trend in the southeast region. For the regional distribution of the last 250 livable cities, the cities are almost concentrated in the northeast, northwest and southwest regions.

The Blue Book shows that in three levels (Good, Average and Poor) of the livable city competitiveness, the central regional has the relative advantage of concentration. In addition, if we look at the level distribution of the livable cities from the perspective of the six regions, the quantitative distribution of the livable level of cities in the southeast region and Circum-Bohai Sea Region is in an inverted triangle shape in which “cities at good level are more than those at poor level”, that of the livable level of cities in the northwest region is in a regular triangle shape in which “cities at good level are fewer than those at poor level”, and that of the livable level of cities in the northeast, northwest and southwest regions is in a spindle shape in which “cities at average level are more than those at good and poor levels”.

Competitiveness of cities suitable for business development: Hong Kong, Beijing and Shanghai rank top three

The Blue Book of Urban Competitiveness points out that Hong Kong is the best benchmarking city and Beijing is the benchmarking city in the Mainland. Top ten cities with the highest scores in the competitiveness ranking of cities suitable for business development include: Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Foshan, Suzhou, Shenzhen, Wuhan, Qingdao and Hangzhou. From the scores we can see that Hong Kong is obvious better than cities in the Mainland, followed by Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. The scores of the rest cities are close, and the cities belong to the third tier in the top ten cities.

From the comparison with the sustainable competitiveness ranking, Hong Kong ranks 1 again; Shanghai’s place is before Beijing in the sustainable competitiveness ranking, which means that Beijing’s business environment is better than that of Shanghai. The places of Guangzhou, Foshan, Suzhou and Wuhan in the ranking of suitability for business development are higher than those in the sustainable competitiveness ranking. Evidently, it is an aspect which improved the competitiveness. Particularly, Foshan only ranks 22 in the sustainable competitiveness ranking but ranks 5 in the competitiveness ranking of cities suitable for business development, which quite recognized its business environment; while the competitiveness of cities suitable for business development was an aspect which reduced the places of Shenzhen, Qingdao and Hangzhou, but its influence was not high.

The ten cities with the lowest scores in the competitiveness ranking of cities suitable for business development include: Songyuan, Baicheng, Qingyang, Zhaotong, Baoshan, Longnan, Dingxi, Lincang, Pu’er and Suihua. Compared with the comprehensive ranking, the places of Songyuan and Baicheng in the competitiveness ranking of cities suitable for business development play a significant role in lagging behind their sustainable competitiveness ranking. For other cities, their places in the ranking of the two kinds of competitiveness are roughly matched.

From the ranking of all the regions we can see that the top 50 cities with the highest competitiveness of cities suitable for business development are non-uniformly distributed in all the regions. The top 50 cities include Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, 45% and 30% of cities respectively from the southeast region and Circum-Bohai Sea Region, and only 2.5% of cities, i.e. 1 city, from the northwest region. Most of the last 50 cities are from the northwest, southwest and northeast regions, and such regions respectively have 41%, 38% and 29% of cities ranking the last 50. The central region and the southeast region respectively have 5 and 1 city ranking the last 50, and none of the last 50 cities is from the Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan regions and the southeast region. The distribution of the top and last 50 places actually confirm the conclusion of the overall average score, and the scores of the competitiveness of cities suitable for business development is approximately consistent with the economic development level.

Cultural city competitiveness ranking: Hong Kong tops the list

The Blue Book of Urban Competitiveness points out that the cities from the southeast region and the Circum-Bohai Sea Region share the top 10 places of the cultural city competitiveness in the comprehensive ranking of multi-cultural cities as estimated. In the weighted ranking, Hong Kong ranks the top with the absolute advantage of high score, the performance of Shanghai, Beijing and Suzhou is also very outstanding, which reflects that the openness and diversity of such cities are quite high. From the overall level we can see that almost all the top 10 cities are coastal cities and they have quite high administrative level; meanwhile, the cultural openness of cities from the central and west regions as well as the northeast region is generally not high. Hong Kong’s international cultural degree is the highest, the cultural development and openness degree of the east coastal cities are mainly depended on their regional advantages, i.e. the convenience in their exchange with the outside world. Therefore, their places are generally higher than those of the cities in the central and west regions.

As a whole, Guangdong Province takes the lead, and has unusually outstanding performance; Jiangsu Province is sure to occupy the second place, which shows the cultural openness and diversity of the cities in the province are also quite high; Shandong Province and Fujian Province still have advantages; the competitiveness of the central and west provinces in cultural openness and diversity is quite low.

From the comparison of regions where China’s cultural cities are distributed we can see that the cultural openness of the east coastal region is the best, and among the samples, Hong Kong and Shanghai respectively rank the top 2 of the cultural cities. From the ranking of 285 cities of China mainland, we can see that the southeast region is undoubtedly the best, 29 of 55 cities from the region rank the top 50 and the proportion is 52.73%. The second is the Circum-Bohai Sea Region, 7 of 30 cities from the region rank the top 50 and the proportion is 23.33%. The third is the northeast region, 3 of 34 cities from the region rank the top 50 and the proportion is 8.82%. The fourth is the central region, 6 of 80 cities from the region rank the top 50 and the proportion is 7.5%. The southwest and northwest regions have poorer performance. 4 of 47 cities from the southwest region rank the top 50 and the proportion is 8.51%. Only 1 of 39 cities from the northwest region ranks the top 50 and the proportion is only 2.56%.