CRI听力:China's City Competitiveness Report Released

The "2015 City Competitiveness Blue Book" has been released by Beijing-based think tank, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

It evaluates a total of 298 cities across China, based on a broad range of indexes covering economic competitiveness, livability, business advantages and sustainability.

The Chinese capital Beijing only managed to clinch the eighth spot.

China's Macau and Taipei are also included in the top ten.

On the Chinese mainland, three cities on the Yangtze River Delta, three cities in the Pearl River Delta, and two cities in the Bohai coastal region made it to the top ten due to the rapid economic growth they have experienced in recent years.

But cities in central and west China lagged behind their east coast counterparts.

Doctor Wang Yufei from the Chinese academy of Social Sciences says that the distribution of the listed cities also indicates the development level of different regions:

"Among the top ten cities are Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, three cities in the Yangtze River Delta, three cities in the Pearl River Delta, and two cities in the Bohai coastal region. Not a single city from central and western regions has made it to the top ten. So we can see that coastal regions have strong economic competitiveness. Moreover, the overall development level of the coastal regions is higher than that of the national average."

The report suggests the city of Shenzhen has surpassed Hong Kong for the first time when it comes to economic competitiveness.

Analysis behind the report suggests that this is due to the repaid development of newly-emerged industries in Shenzhen.

At the same time, the report also reveals that the transportation system is playing an important role when evaluating a city's competitiveness.

Doctor Li Chao from CASS says high-speed railways in particular are changing the country's urban competition pattern:

"According to our analysis, cities with high-speed railways system, be they bullet trains or intercity high-speed rails, have an average comprehensive competitive index level that is over 70-percent higher than those who don't have such transportation systems. And the number is some 57 percent higher when it comes to sustainable competitiveness. So if the coordinated development of different regions can not be dealt with properly, the disparity among different cities might get even higher."

According to the report, eastern China has seen an overcrowded city distribution while the western region is facing the opposite concern.
It also points out that the inter-links between Chinese cities are not well established.

Experts are calling for more intensive integration of central and eastern regions of China, which can also help to speed up urbanization in surrounding west and northeast regions.