Malaysia ranks 18th in World Bank Ranking
29 Oct 2014
Malaysia is ranked 18th out of 189 economies in the World Bank Doing Business 2015: Going Beyond Efficiency report released yesterday.
For 2015 report, the World Bank has adopted a new methodology due to several limitations posed by the previous methodology such as loss of information, inability to track progress and inequality in business-friendliness measured in larger countries.
The new ranking is based on the distance to frontier (DTF) score rather than the percentile rank. The 10 areas of Doing Business covered in the report are starting a business, dealing with construction permits, getting electricity, registering property, getting credit, protecting minority investors, paying taxes, trading across borders, enforcing contracts, and resolving insolvency.
In the 2015 report, Malaysia has recorded improvements in five of the 10 areas covered in the report. Malaysia’s score edged up to 78.83 points from last year’s 76.84 points.
For starting a business, Malaysia recorded the closest DTF points of 94.9% and ranked 13th.The time required to start a business in Malaysia has been reduced to 5.5 days, from six days before, while on cost, referring to percentage of income per capita, it has been reduced to 7.2 % from the previous 7.6%.
On dealing with construction permits, the number of procedures has been reduced to 13 from 15 and it is now ranked 28th from 39th spot in 2014.
On getting electricity, cost in Malaysia has reduced to 46.3 % from 49.1 %.
On registering property, it now takes 13.5 days from the previous 14 days.
It now takes one year from 1.5 years previously, while recovery rate (cents on the dollar) improved to 81.3 from 48.9.
On resolving insolvency, Malaysia recorded a vast improvement in ranking from No. 65 to No. 36. It now takes one year from1.5 years before, while recovery rate (cents on the dollar) improved to 81.3 from 48.9.
Malaysia is ranked high at 5th spot in protecting minority investors and is at a commendable11th placing for trading across borders.
The Minister of International Trade and Industry, Dato’ Sri Mustapa Mohamed in a statement said that the ranking reaffirmed the country’s consistently competitive performance globally.
Noting the areas that need further improvements such as registering property, getting credit and enforcing contracts, the next high-level Special Task Force to Facilitate Business (PEMUDAH) will look into ways to address these areas, Malaysia Productivity Corporation Director-General Datuk Mohd Razali Hussain said after chairing a video conference with the Washington-based World Bank in Kuala Lumpur on the report, yesterday.
The World Bank Senior Country Economist for Malaysia, Frederico Gil Sander explained that the lower scores in some of the areas using the new DTF method did not mean a sudden decline in performance, citing the example of getting credit, as different things were being added in the 2015 evaluation.
Among ASEAN countries, Malaysia came in second after Singapore which was ranked at the top while ahead of other member countries with Thailand at No. 26, Vietnam (78), Philippines (95), Brunei (101), Indonesia (114), Cambodia (135), Lao PDR (148) and Myanmar (177).
Malaysia stayed ahead of advanced economies such as Taiwan (19th), Switzerland (20th), Netherlands (27th), Japan (29th) and also ahead of China (90th) and India (142th).
Overall, Singapore topped the list, followed by, New Zealand and Hong Kong.
Source: Bernama 29 Oct 2014, New Straits Times and The Star 30 Oct 2014 and World Bank Doing Business 2015 Report
Posted on : 29 October 2014
