Beijing rises in ranking due to strong, balanced growth: Kearney

00:58

Beijing has risen to the top five in Kearney's "2020 Global Cities Index (GCI)" as it has shown strong and balanced improvements in various aspects as compared with other cities globally, said Jefferson Wang, global partner at Kearney.

The 2020 Global Cities Report provides a snapshot of where cities stood as they entered the COVID-19 crisis. The most striking change in the

report

was Beijing taking the fifth position in the ranking, unseating Hong Kong, a change in the top five ranks for the first time since 2008.

The top four places on global strategy and management consulting firm's rankings were maintained by New York, London, Paris and Tokyo, while Hong Kong is ranked sixth after Beijing.

"Overall, Beijing showed strong and balanced performance across all GCI dimensions," Wang told CGTN.

"Beijing has improved across most metrics this year. For example, it ranked No. 2 in the business activity dimension thanks to its first spot on Fortune 500 and second spot on business innovation," he said.

"In addition, Beijing continuously improved the scores on human capital, has the leading position in tertiary education, and the diversity of culture activities," he added.

Wang explained that the GCI measures the global cities comprehensively in five dimensions, namely business activities, human capital, information exchange, culture experience and political engagement, under 29 metrics.

Kearney: Chinese cities showing visible progress

Besides Beijing, a number of Chinese cities have also seen a rise in their ranking in the report, including Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Nanjing, Hangzhou, Qingdao, Chongqing and Chengdu.

"In terms of growth rate, Chinese cities are fastest in almost all the dimensions," said Wang.

He said Chinese cities as a whole "made visible progress" as on average, Chinese cities were third in scores of business activity and human capital.

"The outstanding performance in entrepreneurship and innovation are the key reasons. For example, cities such as Nanjing, Hangzhou, Chengdu, Qingdao and Xi'an climbed quickly on the ranking as they have leading positions in the number of unicorn companies, quality of tertiary education and the number of global leading service firms," said Wang.

He also said other cities should learn from the best practices of the top cities and "find the gaps and think and plan their own strategic road map."

"New York, London, Paris and Tokyo maintained their top ranking for more than 10 years. For first-tier global cities, the bar is really high, meaning that you need to lead comprehensively in all the dimensions."