"Global Urban Competitiveness Report 2011-2012" News release
In the context of globalization and urbanization, cities are becomingincreasingly important. The competition among cities brings urban is getting increasinglyfierce. From 2008, the financial tsunami and European debt crisis has began to sweepthe global cities. Up to now the world is still suffer a lot. During the crisis,the pattern of global competitiveness of the cities cast a different change aswell as a new trend.
Today, June 27-28 2012. Sponsored by the Chinese Academy of SocialSciences, and National Academy of Economic Strategy, Chinese Academy of SocialSciences Urban and Competitive research center hosted the Chinese SocialScience Forum (Economics 2012): urban competitiveness of the TenthInternational Forum held in Beijing.forum with both English and Chineseco-editor of the National Academy of Economic Strategy researcher, Academy ofSocial Sciences, Dean of City competitiveness research center, Dr. Ni Pengfei,director of American scholar Peter - Kela Suo,UN Habitat Evaluation andResearch, director of the department's global city Banji Oyelaran-Oyeyinka researchteam, the World Bank Doing Business team, the OECD Lamia Kamal-Chaoui led theOECD urban research team, the world's leading economic sociologist at ColumbiaUniversity Professor Saskia Sassen, the joint creation of the world famous cityof scholars, the British Royal Society Academy of Sciences, Peter J. Taylorstudy team (GAWC) Co-creator << global Urban competitiveness Report21011-2012 >>
This report is drawn from the research CASS scholars have developedthe Global Urban Competitiveness Index:
Compared to 2009-2010 Index, 2011-2012 overall Global UrbanCompetitiveness index declined. The competitiveness of 500 cities down to the2011-2012 mean from 2009-2010 0.328 0.323.Competitiveness of the European andAmerican cities hit an absolute decline. The emerging economies is very active,the decline in the competitiveness is not significant, even some continue torise. Overall, the global urban competitiveness gap was inclined to be narrow.
Top 10 cities ranked among 2011-2012 themost competitive cities in the world: New Yorkranked first, but the index fell by the largest, Hong Kongenhanced very fast.
2011-2012, the top 10 most competitive cities are; New York, London, Tokyo,Paris, San Francisco,Chicago, Los Angles, Singapore,Hong Kong and Seoul.The four biggest “world cities” remain top 4 places, but have experienced absolutecompetitive advantages decease; Asian metropolises continue to rise，Hong Kong is the fastest one.
Global city for the year 2009-2010 compared to enhance thecompetitiveness of the fastest growing top 50 cities found : cities the rapidrise of emerging economies,outstanding performance of the technology centercity.2011-2012 annual Global Competitiveness Index to enhance the fastest in 50cities; San Jose(1), Hong Kong(2), Suzhou(3), Changsha(4), Lagos（5）, Georgetown（6）, Palo Alto（7）, Kingston（8）, Xi'an（9）, Mannheim（10）, Taipei（11）,Kagoshima（12）,Shijiazhuang（13）, Taichung（14）, Porto（15）, Ansan（16）, Keelung（17）, Ningbo（18）, Beirut（19）, Tangshan（20）, Chongqing（21）,Port-au-Prince（22）, Trieste（23）, Madrid（24）, Lille（25）, Havana（26）, Hangzhou（27）, Cordoba（28）, Changchun（29）, Adelaide（30）, Wuhan（31）, Shaoxing（32）, Moscow（33）, Gwangju（34）, Gyeongju（35）, Bonn（36）, Qingdao(37), Baotou(38), NewOrleans(39), Daegu(40), Asuncion(41), Dalian(42), Guayaquil(43), Tunisia(44),Harbin(45), Wuxi(46), Lima(47), Harare(48), Indore(49), Wuhu(50). Through thesedata, we can see that the cities from China,Indiaand other emerging economies accounted for half. Among of them 23 cities fromChina，display auprising power. excellent performance can be seen in the technology center cities,although the technology center city of the total economy is relatively small,there are still 11 cities in the index of competitiveness rise to the fastestgrowing top 50.
Based on the different functions of the 500 cities around the world,we divided cities function into seven functional center, found that the technologycenters’ competitiveness improve dramatically. Financial centers and manufacturing centersfell sharply. Compared 2009-2010 the fast enhancement technology, the top tenfastest cities are: San Jose, Hong Kong, Taipei, Taichung, Madrid, Moscow, Daegu, Tunisia,Singapore, and Bangalore. Among of them,the Silicon Valley in the United States, the core area, San Jose for scientificand technological innovation though suffer a lot from global economy downturn andconsumer environment recession, still be able to substantially enhance theircompetitiveness index, which can be a great guide. Obvious decline took place infinancial centers and manufacturing center. Financial center cities’ index felllargest as: New York, Houston,Tokyo, Toronto, London, Milan, Yokohama, Birmingham, Osaka, Munich.In the financial crisis storm, New York and Houston suffered biglosses; both of cities rank the top two largest drops. Tokyo,London, theworld's financial center is also doomed to decline in the Top 5. The index of manufacturingcenter of the fastest declined cities, Houston, Quebec, Milan, Yokohama,Dusseldorf, Birmingham, Osaka, Manchester, Munich, Atlanta. It can be seen fromthe ranking that the traditional manufacturing center cities of developedcountries in Europe and the United States are dropping significantly. Theimpact of the economic downturn on the manufacturing centers of developedcountries is much higher than developing countries.
Through analysis of research oncompetitiveness input factors: higher output efficiency in North America, Asia has promising potential, European needs to bestrengthened. 2011-2012 competitive factor inputs of the NorthAmerican were significantly higher than in the global ranking of thecompetitiveness. Among the top 100 cities ranked by factor inputs, there are 56cities from North American. But on the contrary, among the top 100 citiesranked by the comprehensive competiveness, there are only 42 cities from NorthAmerican, which shows the competitiveness of cities in North America has a higher conversion efficiency of inputs production. Asiancities factor inputs in the global ranking of the top 100 cities, shared 21,and almost match with comprehensive competitiveness ranking. It is noteworthythat the top 101-200 ranking, 56 cities from Asia,which shows a cheerful potential for development. Europe'soverall competitiveness of factor inputs, there are 27 cities among the top100, much lower than the comprehensive competitiveness of the top 100 ranking,there are only 35. It shows European factor inputs is relatively insufficient;indicates the future potential for development is not potent ,factor inputsneeds to be strengthened.
Industrial Competitiveness: American and European major cities arefacing over -financialization; while emerging economies have entered the periodof the industrial structure transformation. through the analysisof industrial competiveness, the index of industrial structure and industrialsectors in American and European cities is high, while the industrial sectorindex in Asian cities is very low and the industrial structure is just on anaverage level. Furthermore, the top 100 cities of highest industrial structureindex are mainly financial centers or tech centers which are from in Europe,US, Japan and India.Three Chinese cities, Beijing, Shenzhen and Shanghai are on the list.There are 52 cities out of these top 100 cities are financial centers. Summaryfrom the above analysis, north American and European cities show strong overall industrialcompetitiveness with high index scores in both industrial structure andindustrial sectors, among which the high-tech industry is an important backbone.However, the over-financializaton centers shows that their economy depends toomuch on finance, in return, the real industries will be affected. The Asiancities get lowest scores in the industrial sectors and the industrial structureis just on an average level. This shows that the industrial development ofAsian cities is still at the bottom of industrial chain so that industrialupgrading should be promoted and the adjusting paces ofthe industrial structure should be accelerated. At present, since theemerging economies like Beijing and Shanghai have entered theperiod of the industrial structure transformation, it is quite necessaryto seize the opportunity to rapidly promote the industrial competitiveness ofthese cities.
2011-2012 Global UrbanCompetitiveness Report Team led by experts on urban development pattern, thefuture trend, share us with their exceptional personal views as following:
The world famous city of scholars,Peter Taylor, Academician of Royal Academy of Social Science of UK, LoughboroughUniversity of UK:theworld city network analysis faces challenges as the world's urban development isincreasingly complex.
The world's leading economic sociologist from Columbia UniversityProfessor Saskia Sassen: the Specializationis one key vector in urban competitiveness.
Banji Oyelaran Oyeyinka, Directorof UN Human Settlement Promme, Researcher of Research and Training Departmentof UN University, should pay specialattention to social and technological innovations in the Competitiveness ofCities.
Lamia Kamal-Chaoui, the dean of the office of the secretary generalfrom OCED, lead a team explored thedevelopment of green cities and opportunities through the governance casesstudy.
Team of the Doing Business Project of the World Bank Group shows the relationship between the system andurban competitiveness from the perspective of the business environment.
GUCP team, led by Peter Karl Kresl andPengfei Ni, based on the analysis in the global cities development experience, firmly recommended that the city'sdecision-makers should make the driving factors for the development as the coreto promote the urban competitiveness.
2011-2012Global Urban Competitiveness Report published by The Social Sciences AcademicPress and Edward - Eger Press the Fourth Biennial Report of the Global UrbanCompetitiveness Project group, The report will contribute great to the globalgovernment agencies, enterprises, relevant research institutions and the publicbecause of its policy implication and research value.
Enquiries: urban competitiveness of the Chinese Academyof Social Sciences, National Academy of Economic Strategy,CASS ,
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