Can New City Santo Tomas Challenge Batangas’ other Cities in Terms of Competitiveness

Image source:  Google Earth Street View.

When I first shared on social media an article on how the cities of Batangas fared in the 2018 Cities and Municipalities Competitiveness Index of the National Competitiveness Council, somebody quickly popped an intriguing question, “How will the new Batangas city of Santo Tomas fare against the other three cities of the province in the 2019 edition of the competitiveness index?”

For those who don’t already know, President Rodrigo Duterte recently signed a bill converting the erstwhile northern Batangas municipality of Santo Tomas into the province’s 4^th city. The new law takes into effect when the required publications have been made to inform the public; and the formal announcement, according to the regional news, is expected before the end of the year.

But to get back to the crux of the matter, can the new city make an immediate impact on the competitiveness rankings? The answer probably is “not just yet.” The numbers will explain why. In the last three editions of the competitiveness index, Santo Tomas had not even consistently ranked among the top of Batangas’ 31 municipalities.



Consider the following table:

Year	Score	Municipal Rank
2016	31.82	5
2017	36.03	10
2018	37.82	5

The table above shows us that even among the province’s municipalities, in the last three years Santo Tomas did not even rank first nor even among the top three. In fact, its average placement in the same time period was 6.67. If one includes the three cities in the rankings, Santo Tomas’ overall provincial positions in the same time period would be even lower as shown below.

Year	Provincial Rank
2016	8
2017	13
2018	8

The rankings above show that, among Batangas’ 34 local government units (3 cities and 31 municipalities), in the three year period from 2016 to 2018, Santo Tomas’ average ranking has been 9.67.

On the face of things, the City of Lipa, which has consistently ranked bottom among the three cities of Batangas in terms of competitiveness, looks the most vulnerable to the elevation of Santo Tomas to cityhood. Yet, as the table below shows, perhaps it is not.

	Overall Score
	2016	2017	2018
Lipa	33.73	38.88	39.8
Santo Tomas	31.82	36.03	37.82
Difference	1.91	2.85	1.98

Lipa has averaged 37.47 points in the last three editions of the competitiveness index, when its scores consistently landed it behind the cities of Tanauan and Batangas. However, Santo Tomas in the same period averaged only 35.22, 2.25 points behind Lipa. The difference may not seem much, but the final score is arrived at after adding scores at 25% weight each for the four pillars.

The final scores of each of these pillars are arrived at after assigning values to a number of indicators per pillar – 8 for Economic Dynamism; 10 for Government Efficiency; 10 for Infrastructure; and 10 for Resilience. In other words, scoring well in one indicator can easily be diluted by poor scores in others. Thus, Lipa’s 2.25 lead over Santo Tomas in the past three editions of the competitiveness index is not small at all.

That said, several of Batangas’ municipalities improved significantly in 2018 compared to their 2017 scores: Mabini by 3.49 points; Santa Teresita by 3.54 points; San Luis by 3.95 points; Tingloy by 5.47 points; and San Nicolas by a whopping 10.08 points.

While the chances of Santo Tomas quickly overtaking Lipa will be difficult, it certainly won’t be impossible. This is, of course, without considering that both Lipa and Batangas City both have bigger populations and resources than Santo Tomas. At the end of the day, though, how the new city will fare will ultimately depend on its diligence in collecting and presenting accurate data.

Notes and references:
All data used above from the Cities and Municipalities Competitiveness Index