On the health and primary education Lviv Region is at the level of Peru

In The Global Competitiveness Report 2009-2010 Ukraine fell ten places to the 82nd position out of 133 economies. This was the statement of Natalya Izosimova, Managing Director of the Foundation for Effective Governance at a presentation of Ukraine Competitiveness Report developed within the partnership project of the Foundation and the World Economic Forum (WEF).

This is the third consecutive year the Foundation and the World Economic Forum have been analyzing competitiveness of Ukraine on the national and regional levels. According to Nataliya Izosimova this year the Foundation has analyzed competitiveness of 20 Ukrainian regions. Together these regions account for about 90% of the GDP in Ukraine. “In future we plan to cover all regions. This is a very important objective for us: this will help us have a deeper understanding of the challenges to be met by each region to improve its competitiveness”.

According to the report Kiev topped the national rankings as in the past years. In the global ranking the city was ranked 59th, next to Hungary and Panama. Kiev was closely followed by Dnepropetrovsk region and two pairs of regions: Zakarpatye and Lvov regions and Crimea and Donetsk region. Kharkov region rounded out the top five leaders, being ranked 76th in the Global Competitiveness Report between Columbia and Egypt.

The level of welfare of Lviv Region is below the national average while its competitiveness is ranked above the national average. Lviv Region is relatively high assessed as 63rd out of 134 countries and regions; it is behind Russia and ahead of Greece. With the rank above the average Lviv Region has lots of competitive advantages, which put it on the same level as other part of Ukraine.

On the health and primary education Lviv Region ranks 77th out of 134 countries in the global ranking being at the level of Peru. Lviv Region shows lower primary enrollment rate (87.8%) compared with the national average (88.5%). As Lviv City is considered to be a university city tertiary education is above the national average rate. Business representatives also believe that the quality of education is above the average. Lviv Region ranks 54th in the global ranking, while Ukraine ranks a somewhat low 71st. In general the education system is considered to have been adjusted to meet the requirements of competitive economy; and the quality of management schools is assessed as the best in Ukraine (ranks 65th).

Lviv Region is the center of education with ancient traditions - no wonder that the Region’s capacity for innovations is above the national average. This can be regarded as a competitive advantage as the Region has a great number of scientists and engineers (ranks 43rd compared to 70th position of Ukraine) and high quality of research institutions (ranks 44th compared to 60th position of Ukraine).

Poltava, Cherkassy, Khmelnitskiy, Zaporozh’ye, Odessa, Lugansk and Kherson regions were in the middle of the rankings. Volyn, Rovno, Ivano-Frankovsk, Sumy and Zhitomir showed lower competitiveness. Vinnitsa region is the last in the regional rankings. It was ranked 111th, next to Senegal and Serbia.