The Private Competitiveness Council and the Universidad del Rosario presented the results of the Departmental Competitiveness Index for the 32 departments of the country and the city of Bogota.
On this occasion, the department of Cesar was ranked 21st in the measurement, with a score of 4.32 out of 10, ranking ahead of the departments of Córdoba and Sucre, and below Casanare and Nariño.
WHAT DID THE DEPARTMENT FAIL?
Among the items that the index qualifies is innovation, the lowest score for the department of Cesar: 1.01 out of 10. According to the study, in Cesar there is no high-quality research, nor productivity of scientific research, nor synergy of research.
“We’ve been at that for years. They are our worst ratings due to the lack of investment and preparation in technology. Our workforce is not qualified in this sector. In fact, that’s why our rate of unemployment is so high, especially among young people. Because normally these training issues for work are focused on skilled labor in development and use of technology.”, argued the economic analyst José Larrazabal.
GOOD RESULTS
On the contrary, the department presents its best position in the pillar ‘Size of the market‘, in which it reaches a score of 7.26 out of 10. This is as a result of its good performance in the internal market size indicator, in which it occupies the third position with a score of 9.82.
Likewise, the department achieved fourth position in the indicator of the degree of commercial openness with a score of 8.70.
Cesar also presents a favorable performance in the Health pillar, in which it occupies the 12th position with a score of 5.93. It is worth noting its excellent result in the indicator of general and specialized beds, in which it occupies the first position. Likewise, in the pentavalent vaccination coverage indicator, ranking ninth.
On the other hand, Cesar presents his greatest challenges in the pillars of Environmental Sustainability and Labor Market, in which It is located in positions 30 and 29, respectively.
In terms of environmental sustainability, the department achieves a low performance in the indicators of Co2 emissions from mobile sources, ranking 33rd. In the labor market pillar, the Unemployment rate indicators (position 29), and Gap in labor participation between men and women (position 30), show structural shortcomings.
Finally, Cesar registers its greatest advance in terms of scores in the business environment and basic and secondary education pillars, in which it improves by 1.2 and 0.6 points, compared to its 2022 results.