General National Spatial Plan / Shqipëria 2030

process. They aim at developing a series of
key indicators for territorial cohesion, which
can be used to inform the political decisionmaking
and territorial strategy at national
level.
Theme 1: Economic competitiveness and
resilience
• Productivity (GDP per capita) - Despite
bearing certain problems, the GDP per capita
indicator has been widely used and recognized
as the indicator of economic prosperity.
• Employment rate of the population aged
16-64 - The number of the employed people
is decisive for every evaluation regarding the
economic welfare, therefore, it is an essential
indicator.
• Gross expenditure on R&D as percentage of
GDP - The Strategy “Europe 2020” identifies
an objective of 3% of expenditures of GDP
on R&D for the purpose of promoting
novelties and achieving a knowledge and
innovation-based economy. This indicator
gathers all the capital costs carried out by
private or state companies established in
the country, research institutes, universities,
state laboratories, etc., including the foreign
funding for development and research,
but excluding the domestic funding for
development and research intended for
abroad. It is measured as a total value in ALL
(Euro) and as a percentage of the GDP 75 .
• Balance of external/internal trade - This
indicator, evaluated as the most appropriate to
the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) indicator,
a high value of which can be interpreted as
vulnerability to globalisation and absence
of resilience, meanwhile an indicator which
measures the importance of exports or
import/export balance has been evaluated
as more appropriate. The essence is that
indicators should evaluate the importance
of attracting external sources and capacities
inside the territory.
• Economic structure - This indicator
provides important contextual information
regarding the economic specialization degree
or its diversity. Its interpretation demands
care because depending on the case it can
be regarded simultaneously as a relative
strength or vulnerability. Similarly, the issue
of employment rate across private, public and
voluntary sectors is an interesting indicator. It
may happen that the employment rates in the
public sector can be judged as vulnerability,
but alternatively such employment has
historically been a stable and often relatively
well paid and skilled part of local economic
well-being and resilience.
Theme 2: Managed territorial development
• Population density/change – Even where
the compactness of a city or polycentricism
of a territory can be measured, this can not
necessarily be interpreted as a good or a bad
thing because territorial planning is far more
complex than that. The dynamics of population
change are always important to territorial
planning and the distribution of this across the
settlement speaks to issues of polycentricism
and settlement-infrastructure alignment.
Population density is a far less dynamic
indicator though undoubtly provides useful
contextual insight into the characteristics of a
certain territory.
• House completion – The level of house
building (residences) will always be of concern
to territorial planners and so is included as a
core indicator. Ideally, one might equate this
with need for housing, given that population
growth rates are equated or evaluated beyond
differentiated demands for housing, but this
would probably require a bespoke housing
index.
• Modal split – Transportation and the
way people move around are important to
territorial planning and attempts to combat
climate change and fossil fuel dependence. A
core indicator reflecting modal split resonates
with the increased focus on the development
of a low carbon economy.
• Land use change – A measure of land use
change provides useful contextual insights
into the characteristics of areas and a
valuable means of comparison with other
parts of Europe. This indicator also identifies
74
Key Indicators for Territorial Cohesion and Territorial Planning, Targeted Analysis 2013/2/20
75
https://data.oecd.org/rd/gross-domestic-spending-on-r-d.htm
225