Most competitive region in Romania is Bucharest-Ilfov

The most competitive region in Romania is Bucharest-Ilfov and is followed by the West, North-West and Centre regions whereas at the opposite end there is the South-East region, followed by the South-West, North-East and South-Muntenia regions, reads the report 'Romania and the Lisbon Agenda,' which was drawn up by the Group of Applied Economics (GEA).

GEA calculated an index of regional competitiveness on the basis of the structural pointers, considering three economic, social and technological sub-components. Bucharest-Ilfov is by far the most competitive region in Romania.

'Although it is the region with the largest per capita GDP, with the highest productivity, it also has the biggest trade deficit,' said GEA executive manager Liviu Voinea on Wednesday.

The study reveals that Romania has improved its results for a number of structural pointers, especially the ones connected to the investment based economy (per capita DGP, labour productivity, gross fixed capital creation) but does not excel in pointers of the innovation based economy, such as permanent training and namely the share of the adult population taking part in various forms of education and training.

The convergence of the prices to the European average is also more rapid than in Bulgaria or Slovakia and proves the pressure of inflation.

The Group of Applied Economics launched the fifth report 'Romania and the Lisbon Agenda.' GEA regularly publishes this report, which is the only independent assessment of the way in which Romania relates to the aims of the Lisbon Agenda, the main development agenda of the European Union.

This report focuses on the role of the regional competitiveness and is part of the project 'Romania: Building the Capability to Assess Regional Competitiveness in the Context of the Lisbon Agenda,' which is financed by the Global Opportunity Fund, with the support of the Embassy of Great Britain.

ROMPRES