Cebu in the bottom half of competitiveness list

CEBU, Philippines - Coming out from an already dismal performance in 2016, Cebu dropped further in the competitiveness ladder among 71 provinces surveyed by the National Competitiveness Council (NCC) this year.

The council’s 5th Regional Competitiveness Index pegged Cebu’s score at 32.7467 to finish 45th place overall, trailing behind Rizal, South Cotabato, and Cavite that landed in the top three spots in that order.

In 2015, Cebu placed third in the rankings, but it slid down to the 31st place last year after the council deviated from the traditional way of computing Cebu province’s index by excluding the scores of the cities of Cebu and Lapu-Lapu City.

Roy Soledad, Cebu investments and promotions officer, told reporters yesterday that the NCC used four scorecards this year to determine the most competitive city, municipality, and province. These were economic dynamism, government efficiency, infrastructure, and resilience.

Cebu’s overall score, he said, was taken from all the scores collected by the individual cities and municipalities comprising the province.

“Ang kaning ranking man gud sa province is the summary only of the total municipalities and cities under the province. The provincial government is not the one being rated per se. So it is a summary only, wala kami hold sa performance of every LGU because they’re just adding it up,” he said.

Asked why Cebu did not make it to the top 20 at least, Soledad explained that some LGUs in Cebu may have failed NCC’s new criteria of resilience, although he did not elaborate further.

“Daghan na siya nga criteria, daghan na kinahanglan nga i-comply sa checklist. Daghan sila information nga gipangayo, so baga kaayo nga document,” he added.

Soledad said the elimination of Lapu-Lapu and Cebu cities from the overall score of Cebu province may have also affected the rating, especially since these two cities are centers of trade and commerce and considered highly-urbanized cities.

But Cebu Governor Hilario Davide said he is not worried about the ranking.

“I’m not really bothered by that. But sige lang, we are trying to improve the systems… Atong tan-awon pud, but I don’t believe nga wala ta nagpakabana,” he said.

He further refused to believe that the decline in Cebu's ranking in the past two consecutive years implies that the performance of the government units has worsened.

Under the competitiveness survey, four scorecards were used to determine the top cities and municipalities, including economic dynamism, government efficiency, infrastructure, and resilience.

Davide said the province’s ranking was the overall performance of all municipalities and cities in Cebu, and not the performance of the provincial government.

In order to help municipal and city governments in the province, the provincial government has slated a provincial competitiveness challenge on September 15, where the top municipalities and cities from the 1st to 5th-class category will be acknowledged and given a prize that will not go less than P1 million.

Soledad said the amount will serve as an additional fund for those LGUs that lack programs.

Among Cebu’s LGUs, the municipality of Cordova ranked 20th in the 3rd to 6th-class municipality category while Cebu City ranked 13th in the urbanized cities category this year, data from the NCC website showed. (FREEMAN)