WASHINGTON — Oman stands fourth among Arab countries in 2014 Doing Business Report which was released by the World Bank in co-operation with International Finance Corporation (IFC) and posted on the website yesterday. The Sultanate came after the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. Qatar stood fifth and Tunisia in sixth place. The Sultanate ranked 47th in the world.
The Sultanate got 9th place globally in paying taxes index, 21st place registering property index, 77th in starting a business index, 69th in dealing with construction permit index, 58th in getting electricity index, 86th in getting credit index, 98th in protecting investors index, 47th in trading across borders index, 107th place in enforcing contracts index and 72nd place in resolving insolvency index.
Singapore topped in the international classification, followed by Hong Kong, New Zealand, the US, Denmark and Malaysia.
The Doing Business 2014 is an annual survey on the facilitation of business practices in different parts of the world, which has spotted a rise in the pace of business reforms over the past year when 114 economies have implemented 238 reforms, compared to 108 economies and 201 reforms in 2011 and 2012.
Rita Ramalho, Programme Manager at the World Bank Group, noted that this year has seen a number of reforms, up 18 per cent, the second highest number of reforms since the financial crisis.
She added that this recovery in the pace of reform of the regulations carries the good news for small and medium-sized enterprises, which represent the main generator of jobs in many parts of the world.
The report indicated that while the high-income economies in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development continue to top the list as the best performing economies in most of the areas measured by Doing Business Report, Europe and Central Asia move towards narrowing the gap
with the region at the same level or possibly preceded by three of the 10 areas while immediately followed by two others. — ONA