Economic Policy and Competitiveness Research Center (EPCRC) introduced the Ulaanbaatar District Competitiveness Report 2019 on Mar 21, 2019.

Enkhtur.D, Ulaanbaatar’s Deputy Mayor; Gantumur.T, General Manager and Chief Executive Officer of the City; Mark Koenig, Country Representative of the Asia Foundation; Tsagaan. P, Chairman of Board, EPCRC; representatives from the Governor’s office, City council, the Citizens’ Representatives Council; District Governors and Heads of District Citizen Representative’s khural and researchers participated in the report launch event.

EPCRC has started to research district competitiveness since 2017 and set a goal to research changes and prospects of the district competitiveness every two years. Thus, we have produced our second report with the support from the Asia Foundation.

Within this research, district competitiveness is measured according to the quality of life, living environment, safety and security, governance and economic performance: altogether 5 main factors and those are divided into a total of 150 individual criteria.

In order to gather data of the criteria, a household survey was carried out among randomly selected households from all 9 districts of Ulaanbaatar as well as the official statistics of the districts were used.

Using the 150 criteria of the district competitiveness, we calculate competitiveness index scores of each district and Ulaanbaatar city. Overall district competitiveness index is scored from 0 to 1 and 0 indicates a low level of competitiveness, while 1 indicates a high level of competitiveness.

Overall competitiveness index of Ulaanbaatar city is 0.557 points. As for the districts, Khan-Uul, Bayangol and Bayanzurkh districts have performed the best, while the remote districts, Baganuur, Bagakhangai, and Nalaikh districts have lower performance in contrast to the other districts as for the overall competitiveness index.

In comparison to the previous year’s results (2017), the overall competitiveness index of the Ulaanbaatar city has increased by 7.1% or from 0.520 to 0.557.

The research aim is not to contest the districts but to identify their differences in development, their current level of competitiveness and their strengths and weaknesses. On the other hand, policy-makers, private enterprises, and citizens should consider each criteria meticulously in order to initiate new ideas and work to strengthen each criteria further.