Main themes
Legislation
Governance
Economy

Title
Competitive Cities for Jobs and Growth: What, Who and How

Focus
This lecture aims to introduce how cities can successfully introduce and harness levers to improve their competitiveness, facilitating firm and industry growth to create jobs, raise productivity and increase incomes.

Issues which the lecture addresses
Many developing economies are experiencing a demographic and spatial transition, with millions of new entrants coming in to the urban labor market. 80% of global economic activity is generated in cities today, but not all cities are able to enjoy economic prosperity. How can a city become competitive, i.e. facilitate firms and industries to grow jobs, productivity and incomes over time? Based on the World Bank’s analysis of over 750 cities worldwide, this lecture will present the need for competitive cities, how selected cities have successfully become competitive, and the tools that can be used to help cities understand and develop competitiveness.

Short analysis of the above issues
Competitive cities have several common traits, including: 1) Accelerated economic growth – The top 10 percent of cities achieved 13.5 percent annual gross domestic product (GDP) per capita growth, compared with 4.7 percent in an average city; 2) Outstanding job growth – The top 10 percent of cities achieved 9.2 percent annual job growth, while the remaining 90 percent only achieved 1.9 percent; 3) Increased incomes and productivity – The top 10 percent of cities increased the average disposable income of their households by 9.8 percent annually; 4) Magnets for foreign direct investment (FDI) – The top 5 percent of cities obtained as much FDI as the bottom 95 percent of cities combined. While there is no single recipe for becoming a competitive city, common patterns of high economic performance emerge. These traits can guide other cities that are designing and implementing their own economic development strategies, e.g. through examining their economic structure, making use of policy levers and building successful growth coalitions.

Propositions for addressing the issue
The lecture will touch on four policy levers available to cities to increase their competitiveness: 1) Institutions and Regulations; 2) Infrastructure; 3) Skills & Innovation and 4) Enterprise Support & Finance. Drawing on examples of work done in successful competitive cities (e.g. Changsha in China and Gazientep in Turkey), as well as the World Bank’s work in client cities, the lecture will also demonstrate how analytical and implementation support tools can further help cities develop their competitiveness.

Additional Reading Materials
Competitive Cities report: http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/902411467990995484/Competitive-cities-for-jobs-and-growth-what-who-and-how