• Tokyo edges Singapore (2nd) and Osaka (3rd)again to take the top spot in 2019.
• Alongside Tokyo, Singapore and Osaka, Sydney(5th), Seoul (tied 8th) and Melbourne (10th) make up the six APAC cities in thetop 10.
• The remaining top ten cities are: Amsterdam (4th),Toronto (6th), Washington, DC (7th) and Copenhagen (tied 8th).
• The 2019 edition of the index includes ten new indicators, of which eightare related to environmental resilience.

SINGAPORE - MediaOutReach- 29 August 2019 - The Economist Intelligence Unit today releases thethird edition of the Safe Cities Index (SCI) at the Safe Cities Summit in Singapore . The index, which is the centre piece of a researchproject sponsored by NEC Corporation, ranks 60 cities worldwide across fivecontinents. It measures the multifaceted nature of urban safety, withindicators organised across four pillars: digital, infrastructure, health andpersonal security.

Cities in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region make up six of the top ten safestcities with Tokyo taking the top spot for the third time in a row. The Japanesecapital records the strongest performance in the digital security category, andit has also risen eight places in the infrastructure security category since2017.

Along with Tokyo, other APAC cities, as in the past, dominate the SCI2019.Singapore and Osaka come second and third, while Sydney and Melbourne also makethe top ten. Although Hong Kong has dropped out of this group since 2017, Seoulhas joined the top taking eighth place with Copenhagen.

Naka Kondo, senior editor of The Economist Intelligence Unit, and editor ofthe SCI2019 report, says:

"Our research shows that a city's region does not have anystatistically significant relationship with SCI2019 performance. Although APACcities such as Tokyo, Singapore and Osaka continue to rank within the top threecities in the Index, the region also hosts some of the lowest scoring cities inthe world, with Yangon, Karachi and Dhaka close to the bottom of the list. APACcities perform well across the categories of health security, infrastructuresecurity and personal security, but their North American counterparts generallyfare better in digital security, accounting for seven of the top ten cities inthis category."

The SCI2019benefits from a major revision designed to better capture "urbanresilience"--the ability of cities to absorb and bounce back from shocks--aconcept that has had an increasing influence on thinking in urban safety overthe last decade, especially as policymakers worry about the implications ofclimate change. The 2019 edition is the third, following the 2015 and 2017 editions.

The SCI2019 scores are not evenly spread, with a large number of citiesclustered at the top, and the rest showing wider variation in scores. Just tenpoints separate the overall scores of the top 24 cities, while the following 36are 40 points apart.

Research shows that the performance of different safety pillars correlatesvery closely with each other, signifying that different kinds of safety arethoroughly intertwined. The top performers in each pillar are as follows:

Digital security : Tokyo (1), Singapore (2),Chicago (3), Washington, DC (4), Los Angeles/San Francisco (5)

Health security : Osaka (1), Tokyo (2), Seoul(3), Amsterdam (4), Stockholm (5)

Infrastructure security : Singapore (1), Osaka (2), Barcelona (3), Tokyo(4), Madrid (5)

Personal security : Singapore (1), Copenhagen(2), Hong Kong (3), Tokyo (4), Wellington (5)

The leading cities got the basics right, including easy access tohigh-quality healthcare, dedicated cyber-security teams, community-based policepatrolling and/or disaster continuity planning. The accompanying SCI2019 reportexplores the index results, incorporating 14 in-depth interviews with industryexperts around urban safety.

 "Overall,while wealth is among the most important determinants of safety, the levels oftransparency--and governance--correlate as closely as income with index scores. Ourresearch shows the many ways that transparency and accountability are essentialin every pillar of urban security, from building safer bridges to developingthe trust needed for relevant stakeholders to share information oncyber-attacks. The research also highlights how different types of safety arethoroughly intertwined--that it is rare to find a city with very good results inone safety pillar and lagging in others. Policies, service planning andprovision should also take this into account--and this year, we have decided toconvene stakeholders from around the world in a Safe Cities Summit to discusssuch matters around urban safety," says Ms Kondo.

Visit safecities.economist.com for the full report, videos andinfographics

Notes to editors

About the Safe Cities Index (SCI) 2019

The SCI2019,similarly to the previous two editions, is centred around digital security,health security, infrastructure security and personal security. The 2019 indexranks 60 cities across57 indicators. The 2019 framework has been refined to better capture a city'sclimate change or disaster risk resilience/preparedness. For more on the index methodology,please see the methodology appendix at the end of the report.  Please access this link(https://safecities.economist.com) for the white paper, infographic and thevideo.

Due to thechange in city coverage and additional indicators, direct year-on-yearcomparisons between cities are not possible. Scores and rankings reflect therelative performance ofa city and should be considered for the year in scope, especially due tochanges in methodology/indicators and cities in scope in the 2019 edition.

The 60 cities covered in the index are (in orderof the overall ranking):

North America: Toronto, Washington, DC, Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Dallas.

Latin America: Santiago,Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, SãoPaulo, Mexico City, Lima, Quito, Bogota and Caracas.

Europe: Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Stockholm, London, Frankfurt, Zurich, Brussels, Paris, Madrid,Barcelona, Milan, Rome, Moscow and Istanbul.

Middle East and Africa: Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Kuwait City, Riyadh, Johannesburg, Casablanca, Baku, Cairo and Lagos.

Asia-Pacific: Tokyo, Singapore, Osaka, Seoul, Sydney, Melbourne, HongKong, Taipei, Wellington, Beijing, Shanghai, Kuala Lumpur, Ho Chi Minh City,Manila, Mumbai, Bangkok, New Delhi, Jakarta, Dhaka, Karachi and Yangon.

About The Economist Intelligence Unit

The Economist Intelligence Unit is the thoughtleadership, research and analysis division of The Economist Group and the worldleader in global business intelligence for executives. We uncover novel andforward-looking perspectives with access to over 650 expert analysts andeditors across 200 countries worldwide. More information can be found on　www.eiuperspectives.economist.com. Follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook

About NEC Corporation

NEC Corporation is a leader in the integration of IT and networktechnologies that benefit businesses and people around the world. The NEC Groupglobally provides "Solutions for Society" that promote the safety, security,efficiency and equality of society. Under the company's corporate message of"Orchestrating a brighter world", NEC aims to help solve a wide range ofchallenging issues and to create new social value for the changing world oftomorrow. For more information, visit NEC at https://www.nec.com.