Posted on October, 25, 2019 at 09:24 am
TANZANIA has made an improvement in the latest World Bank’s ease of doing business ranking released yesterday, shifting from 144 out 190 countries surveyed last year to 141, and fourth in the East African region after Rwanda, Kenya and Uganda.
Rwanda is ranked 29 among 190 economies included in the report, an improvement from 41st position in the previous report. Kenya improved significantly to 61 in 2018 from 80 in 2017.
Uganda however has slipped to 127 in the 2018 survey from 122 in 2017 rankings, while Burundi declined to 168 in 2018 rankings from 164 in 2017.
After the release of last year’s report, the government implemented a number of reforms aimed at improving ease of doing business in the country including addressing bureaucracy, changes in various laws to remove multiple regulation, eliminating nuisance taxes and fighting corruption.
Among the reforms include the recent merger of roles of the Tanzania Bureau of Standards (TBS) and the then Tanzania Food and Drugs Authority (TFDA) whose food regulation role has been transferred to TBS and was renamed the Tanzania Medicines and Medical Devices Authority (TMDA).
The government has also introduced a blueprint to enhance a conducive business environment by carrying out holistic regulatory reforms. The blueprint seeks to put in place a framework for addressing regulatory hurdles and create a smart, functional and fair business regulatory regime.
A statement released by the World Bank headquarters in Washington said economies in Sub-Saharan Africa continued to improve their business climates, with the region’s largest economy, Nigeria, earning a place among the year’s top global improvers, alongside Togo.
Economies of the region enacted 73 reforms in the 12 months leading to May 1, down from a record high of 108, and the number of countries implementing at least one reform declined to 31 from 40. The regional average ease of doing business score was 51.8 on a scale of 0 to 100, below the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) high-income average of 78.4 and the global average of 63.0.
Togo is on the list of top improvers for the second year in a row thanks to reforms lowering fees for construction permits and streamlining property registration procedures, among other measures. Nigeria conducted reforms impacting six indicators, including making the enforcement of contracts easier, which placed the 200 million people economy among the world’s top improvers.
Kenya carried out six notable reforms, including improving the reliability of its electricity supply and introducing an online system for social security contributions, positioning it third in the regional rankings, behind Mauritius and Rwanda. With four reforms implemented this year, Mauritius remains the easiest place to do business in the
region, ranking 13th globally. Among other reforms, the country made resolving insolvency easier and improved contract enforcement.
Elsewhere, Cape Verde and Eswatini each carried out four reforms, a record for both. Zimbabwe improved in five areas measured by Doing Business while the Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon and Rwanda advanced in three. Due to active reform efforts, scores for Niger and Senegal improved significantly.
“The region conducted the most reforms in starting a business, dealing with construction permits and getting credit, with twelve reforms in each area. Thanks to initiatives led by the Central African Economic and Monetary Community, getting credit became easier in several economies in the region,” the report noted.
The region’s economies performed best in starting a business and getting credit, with three economies – Kenya, Rwanda and Zambia – ranking among the world’s top 10 in the latter category. On average, it now takes around 20 days and costs 33.5 per cent of income per capita to start a new business in the region, substantially faster and less expensive than the 62 days and 305% of income per capita it took in 2003.
“With reforms led by the Organization for the Harmonization of Business Law in Africa last year and the Central African Economic and Monetary Community this year, economies in Sub-Saharan Africa have demonstrated how regional cooperation can help to effectively improve the business climate,” said Santiago Croci Downes, programme manager of the Doing Business unit.
Despite advancements, the pace of reforms across the region has slowed overall, and there is scope to improve performance, reform impact, and implementation, it said.
Only two Sub-Saharan African economies rank in the top 50 in the ease of doing business rankings while most of the bottom 20 economies in the global rankings are from the region. South Africa implemented a single reform this year and four in the past five years, indicating the difficulty it faces in that regard.
Liberia has implemented only three reforms in the past five years, while Burundi, the Central African Republic and Namibia have implemented only four.
Compared to other parts of the world, Sub-Saharan Africa still underperforms in several areas. In getting electricity, for example, businesses must pay more than 3,100 per cent of income per capita to connect to the grid, compared to just over 400 per cent in the Middle East and North Africa or 272 per cent in Europe and Central Asia. When it comes to trading across borders and paying taxes, businesses spend about 96 hours to comply with documentary requirements to import, versus 3.4 hours in OECD high-income economies, and small and medium-size businesses in their second year of operation need to pay taxes more than 36 times a year, compared to an average of 23 times globally.
Source: IPP Media