The Cities and Municipalities Competitiveness Index (CMCI) 2018 results awarded Iloilo City first place as the most improved local government unit (LGU) for highly urbanized city (HUC) with Bacolod City ranked third. Mandaue City was in second place.

 

Iloilo City was recognized as the most improved LGU after leaping 21 notches higher from its previous rank of 32 to 11. Mandaue City jumped from rank 26 to 13, with a difference of 13 ranks, and Bacolod City from rank 20 in 2017 to rank eight (8) in 2018.

 

In the component cities category, Cadiz City, Negros Occidental ranked second with Mabalacat City, Pampanga in first place and Talisay City, Cebu in third. In the 1st to 2nd class municipality category, all the awardees came from Region VI — 1st – San Jose, Antique; 2nd – Kalibo, Aklan; and, 3rd – Sibalom, Antique. While, in the 3rd to 6th class municipality, Malinao, Aklan and Dao, Capiz were awarded 1st and 3rd places, respectively. Zaragoza, Nueva Ecija was in second place.

 

The cities and municipalities are ranked on their competitiveness based on an overall competitiveness score. The overall competitiveness score is the sum of scores on four main pillars namely: economic dynamism, government efficiency, infrastructure, and resiliency.

 

Aside from the most improved category, other awards received by the LGUs from Region VI are:

 

Overall Most Competitive LGU

Government Efficiency

Infrastructure

Resiliency

 

Government efficiency defines the reliability of government services and government support for effective and sustainable productive expansion program of the LGU. Infrastructure provides physical building blocks that connect, expand, and sustain a locality and its surroundings to enable the provision of goods and services. While, resilience shows the capacity of a locality to facilitate businesses and industries to create jobs, raise productivity and increase the incomes of citizens over time despite of the shocks and stresses it encounters.

 

Economic dynamism, on the other hand, are the presence of activities that create stable expansion of businesses and industries and higher employment. A concrete representation of productivity as it matches the output of the local economy with local resources.

 

DTI VI Regional Director Rebecca M. Rascon said that the recent results showed that the LGUs in Western Visayas can do more to provide an enabling environment for economic initiatives, elevate productivity, and become competitive.

 

This year, participation of Western Visayas has increased from 97 percent to 100 percent.

 

The result on rankings were based on the validation processes conducted in the country’s 33 HUCs, 874 LGUs under the 3rd to 6th Class Municipalities and, 489 LGUs under the 1st to 2nd Class Municipalities or a total of 1,396 LGUs in the Philippines.

 

The CMCI is an annual ranking of the country’s cities and municipalities developed by the National Competitiveness Council through the Regional Competitiveness Committees with the assistance of the United States Agency for International Development.♦