The Competitiveness of Podkarpackie Region in Poland: A Comparative Analysis With Respect to Chosen Benchmarks

Abstract

Regional competitiveness is a phenomenon that is permanently inscribed in the process of managing the socioeconomic development of regions. Institutions of public administration at every level must take into account this aspect when planning strategic policy interventions. This article focuses on the regional dimension, which is essential for cohesion and development policies within the European Union. Effective management of growth, however, requires an appropriate definition of the concept of competitiveness, as well as measuring its condition. This article is an attempt to do this for one region in Eastern Poland: Podkarpackie.Currently, Podkarpackie is the only region of Eastern Poland that have built a development policy on the basis of innovation. At the same time, the region has many historically conditioned structural problems that hinder its development. It is also strongly determined by the interaction with sub-regional growth centers such as Krakow and Warsaw. Therefore, it is an interesting region to study competitiveness.In order to measure the competitive position we used the model of competitiveness developed by J. Strojny 4 . For its construction the AHP method was used. Then, on the basis of collected statistical variables, a comparative analysis between Podkarpackie and other regions was carried out. Both the zero-unitarisation method and single-based indices were applied.