A Spatial Analysis of Crime Trends and Solution Efficiency across Philippine Police Regional Offices
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Abstract
Monitoring and analysis of crime trends is crucial for improving public safety and effective law enforcement, especially in a country which has a large geographic and socioeconomic diversity such as the Philippines. While past studies have demonstrated the value of hotspot mapping and spatial statistics in urban contexts, few studies have systematically addressed the inter-regional disparities in both crime incidence solution efficiency across regions using advanced spatial analysis. This study seeks to fill this gap through spatial- statistical techniques such as hotspot mapping, Global Moran's I, Spatial Lag Modeling, and spatial scan statistics on crime data from the Philippines for a period from January 2022 to September 2023. The analysis showed a high spatial clustering of reported crimes in highly urbanized areas like the NCR, CALABARZON, and Central Visayas. Spatial regression identified unemployment, population, and the number of police stations as significant factors influencing reported crime cases The spatial clustering highlighted regions with low-risk that had significantly a smaller number of crime cases than expected. The study’s findings underscore the need for prioritizing resources in high-crime urban regions, enhancing community policing and inter-agency coordination, and investing in education and employment opportunities. Finally, the study recommends future research at finer geographic and temporal levels for more refined policy development.
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