Vancouver has 5th lowest business costs among 29 global cities: poll

Vancouver is one of the most competitive cities in the world for doing business, according to a recent report by KPMG.

The accounting giant’s Competitive Alternatives Report ranked the city as having the fifth lowest business costs of 29 global leaders.

Vancouver ranked behind front-runners Monterrey and Mexico City, Mexico, and closely trailed Montreal and Toronto.

The city was buoyed along with its Canadian counterparts by the weak dollar last year, but dragged down relative to them by its high property costs, according to the report.

Mayor Gregor Robertson said the ranking was evidence that the city was one of the most thriving and competitive places to do business in North America.

“Last year was record setting for new office space, new rental housing, construction investment, tourism visits and growth in our tech and innovation sectors.

“Vancouver’s economic action strategy is working,” Robertson said in a news release.

Ian McKay, the CEO of the Vancouver Economic Commission, said the study is “further validation of the message we tell around the world: Vancouver has a wealth of competitive advantages — an extraordinarily competitive tax regime, first rate infrastructure and some of the most productive, most creative talent on the planet.”

But it is the lagging dollar that has given Vancouver and other Canadian cities their biggest advantage over their international counterparts, KPMG found.

The study compared 111 leading cities in 10 North American, European and Asian-Pacific countries, and ranked them according to factors like labour, facility, transportation and utility costs, taxes, incentives and costs of capital.

When factoring smaller cities into the ranking, Kelowna edged Vancouver as the most competitive city in the U.S. and Canadian Pacific region.