By Ahikam Pasion/PNA
DAGUPAN CITY – The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) has again recognized this city as the Overall Most Competitive City in Region 1 (Ilocos) based on the latest Regional Competitiveness Council’s 2018 Cities and Municipalities Competitiveness Index (CMCI).
Dagupan City has topped the Regional CMCI under the independent component city category for the third consecutive year.
Mayor Belen Fernandez, in her social media post on Thursday, assured continuous improvement for the city’s people, as the local government unit here was also recognized by DTI as number one both in Government Efficiency and in Economic Dynamism in the region.
“With these recently received awards, Dagupan is now ranked 14th in the overall national competitiveness index, 13th in Economic Dynamism nationwide, and 7th place in Government Efficiency among all component cities in the country,” she also said in her post.
The people of Dagupan will benefit through good governance and zero corruption with continuing projects in the city, Fernandez said.
She guarantees far more improvement as a new government center will be put up in Dagupan.
“Once the new government center is put up, we will be expecting more services to be delivered to our people while at the same time ensuring the ease of doing business in our city. The business sector and the public are assured that there will be no corruption and no red tape in our city,” Fernandez said.
According to DTI, the Cities and Municipalities Competitiveness Index (CMCI) is an annual ranking of different cities and municipalities in the country based on a tool developed by the National Competitiveness Council (NCC).
This tool is positioned to empower Local Government Units (LGUs) by measuring their current level of competitiveness against global standards, identify areas for growth and development and introduce possible reforms and initiatives to further boost local competitiveness.
The framework of the CMCI is drawn from the goal to make the country more globally competitive by measuring local competitiveness based on four major criteria – economic dynamism, government efficiency, Infrastructure, and resiliency.
Dagupan City’s award was received by Fernandez and other city officials during the 4th CMCI Recognition and Awarding ceremonies held at the Diego Silang Hall of the Provincial Capitol in La Union on Wednesday.
