Regional development and its measurement in Visegrad Group countries

Abstract

The aim of the paper is to measure regional development and construct an index for the Visegrad Group countries at NUTS 2 level. This index, called the Regional Development Index - the RDI - is created as an extension of the Human Development Index in order to obtain a better composed index at regional level. Twelve socio-economic indicators are selected for this purpose: three economic indicators, three educational indicators, three health variables and three indicators of the standard of living which create four dimensions. These variables are tested for their reliability through the pairwise correlation and the min-max method is used for the construction of the index. The data are compared between 2008 and 2013 and the assumption about worsening the situation in regions after the crisis is set. The results show that the values of the RDI improved in nearly all regions (with the exception of Prague in the Czech Republic and Közép-Magyarország in Hungary) in the monitored years. The assumption that regional development was negatively influenced by economic crisis has not been confirmed.