Melbourne has good infrastructure, education, healthcare and low crime rate.
By Dileep Thekkethil
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Whenever the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) publishes the annual livability ranking report, all eyes goes to the top tier, searching for the best cities to live, but this year the trend has changed due to the unrest in several cities.
According to the report that was published recently, the instability caused as a result of terror strikes and internal conflict has resulted in many countries slipping down heavily in their rankings compared to last year.
The last 12 months have witnessed many battle ridden days, starting from the terrorist shooting in France and Tunisia to the on-going combat in Ukraine, Syria and Iraq to contain the IS militant force. Issues like these have particularly doomed the livability ranking of many countries that fared better in the last year’s report.
The Australian city of Melbourne topped the list of livable cities with high living standards, good infrastructure facilities, education, healthcare system and low crime rate. Vienna and Vancouver are in the second and third positions in EIU’s list of most livable cities.
On the contrary, the Syrian city of Damascus is the most precarious place to live as the civil war reached the worst phase during the last one year. It is followed by Dhaka and Port Moresby that are placed in 139 and 138 positions respectively.
That said, many European and North American countries have seen a decline in the livability score mainly because of the Charlie Hebdo attacks in the heart of Paris and a series of racist attacks in the US.
The report also says the decreasing stability in many regions have caused the global average score to decline. In the last five years, the global average livability score has fallen by 1% bringing it to 75%. The worst decline was registered during the last 12 months, says the report.
The report reads, “The EIU ranking, which provides scores for lifestyle challenges in 140 cities worldwide, shows that since 2010 average livability across the world has fallen by 1%, led by a 2.2% fall in the score for stability and safety. While this may seem marginal, it highlights that 57 of the cities surveyed have seen declines in livability over the last five years”.
Some other cities that trailed in the last year’s list have now improved their position, this includes seven Chinese cities which saw a decrease in the threat caused by civil unrest. The report says, “Chinese cities saw livability fall in the wake of riots and unrest in 2012, most notably due to widespread anti-Japanese sentiment.”
China’s capital city Beijing took a jump and moved to 69th position improving its score by five places. On the other hand, Hong Kong registered a dip in its ranking declining 3.5% due to the pro-democracy protest in the city. Anyhow, Hong Kong maintained the 46th position above its rival Singapore which is in the 49th place.
Intriguing take away for the United States in this year’s livability report is with regard to the homicide rates. While the report boasts New York’s low homicide rate which is 3.9 in 2014, Detroit reported a higher rate of 44 per 100,000 during the same year.
Jon Copestake, editor of the EIU survey said, “Hong Kong’s livability has been hit by the disruptive protests that took place last year. The city retains bragging rights over its regional competitor Singapore, but by a tiny margin. In fact, both cities can still lay claim to being in the top tier of livability where few, if any, aspects of life are restricted. This has not been the case in other parts of the world, with instability and unrest features undermining the scores of a number of cities globally.
Top five most livable cities:
1. Melbourne, Australia
2. Vienna, Austria
3. Vancouver, British Columbia
4. Toronto, Canada
5. Adelaide, Australia
5. Calgary, Canada
Least five livable cities:
136. Tripoli, Libya
137. Lagos, Nigeria
138. Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea
139. Dhaka, Bangladesh
140. Damascus, Syria
1 Comment
I didn’t know B.C. succeeded from Canada and became it’s own country. Last time I checked it hadn’t.