Singapore leads in economic sustainability in Asia

The Lion City also ranked second in the overall global index.

Ranking highly in profit performance, Singapore emerged as the most sustainable city in Asia in this year’s Arcadis Sustainable Cities Index. It also finished second globally, tailing Zurich at the top spot.

The survey revealed that the city-state outperformed the cities of Seoul and Hong Kong which ranked second and third in Asia respectively. The three economic centres were the only Asian cities that made it to the top 20 of the overall global ranking with Seoul at 7th place and Hong Kong at 16th. Zurich leads in sustainability worldwide and tops the planet sub-index.

Singapore figured prominently in the profit sub-index, which measures the economic sustainability of a city. Along with Hong Kong, the Southeast Asian economy ranked among the most prosperous cities in the world driven by its strong performance across a number of metrics such as tourism, connectivity and ease of doing business. This affirmed the Lion City’s strength as a leading financial hub in the world.

“The Asian cities of Singapore and Hong Kong rank highly in profit performance, but this seems to be straining social sustainability. Factors such as the high cost of living mean these cities, sitting first and second in the profit rankings, place 48th and 81st respectively for people,” the survey said.

The index, compiled for Arcadis by the Centre for Economic and Business Research, explores three pillars of sustainability – social (people), environmental (planet) and economic (profit) to develop an indicative ranking of 100 of the world’s leading cities. It analyses 32 different indicators, such as education, work-life balance, property prices, energy use, pollution measures, GDP per capita, and ease and cost of doing business, the survey explained.

The research showed that cities around the world were not effectively balancing these three pillars of sustainability. Instead, many demonstrated split personalities. While taking the lead in some areas, cities often underperform in one element of sustainability which negatively impacts their overall performance.

“In order to improve their sustainability, city leaders are encouraged to put people at the heart of their sustainability plans and use the index to help them to compare and learn from similar cities across the world,” the survey added.