Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine, has retained its 1st place in the national ranking according to Ukrainian National Competitiveness Report 2011 presented by the Foundation for Effective Governance on Wednesday in Kyiv.

According to the Report Dnipropetrovsk Oblast maintains its position at 2nd place, the same as last year.

Kharkiv, Kyiv and Donetsk Oblasts are also among the top five regions. Kharkiv Oblast has moved up four positions and Donetsk Oblast has climbed one position (Kyiv Oblast was not included in the national ranking 2010) from last year when the ranking included 20 out of 27 regions.

The next five regions include Zaporizhzhya Oblast (ranked 11th in 2010), Sevastopol City (the city was not available in the Report 2010), Odesa (12th), Poltava (8th) and Lviv (4th) Oblasts.

Zakarpattia Oblast and AR Crimea have fallen in the ranking over the year: they dropped from 3rd last year to 18th this year and 5th last year to 22nd this year respectively.

Zhytomyr, Ternopil, Chernihiv and Kherson Oblasts are at the bottom of the national ranking 2011.

According to the authors of the Report the survey demonstrates a wide regional disparity between the best and the worst performers on such pillars as infrastructure, higher education and training, technological readiness and market size. This disparity is not only between the regions but inside each Oblast as well. For example, Kyiv is a national leader in such pillars as infrastructure, higher education and training, technological readiness and market size, but it is at the very bottom of the list on institutions. On the contrary, Ternopil Oblast, which is ranked 24th in the national ranking, has relatively low scores on institutions, primary education and financial market sophistication.

“At this time of reforms Ukrainian National Competitiveness Report developed by FEG is of great value and importance. It becomes an important instrument for monitoring economic reforms both by central and regional authorities. At the same time it is the basis for making decisions by the investors who as we know look at each individual region rather than at Ukraine as a whole,” stated Director of the Foundation Natalia Izosimova.

She also reported that the Foundation for Effective Governance has launched a special web-portal this year, which gives a detailed description of the results of the recent report and of the three previous reports as well as describes the country’s position in the rankings and ratings of international financial organizations and other international structures.

The Foundation for Effective Governance was founded upon the initiative of Mr. Rinat Akhmetov in 2007 for elaboration and implementation of projects and programs, targeted at sustainable development of the Ukrainian economy.

The National Competitiveness Report was compiled using the methodology of the World Economic Forum. As a part of the survey process the Foundation engaged GFK Ukraine, which helped to interview 2,100 company executives.