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Pakistans business environment on the mend

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Pakistans business environment on the mend


Mehtab Haider

Friday, October 31, 2014

ISLAMABAD: The business environment in Pakistan has noticeably improved over the last one year and the World Bank raised the
countrys overall ranking to 128 from 166 in its Doing Business 2015 report.
The World Bank, in its report on Thursday, said the taxpayers in the country still require 594 hours per year to pay their due taxes.
The countrys ranking for starting business stands at 116 in the index. There are 10 procedures required before starting a business.
Pakistans ranking in terms of paying taxes is 174 as taxpayers have to make 47 payments and consume 594 hours per year for the
payments.
When it comes to construction permits, Pakistans ranking stands at 125. A permit seeker has to go through 10 procedures and 249
days per year for the document. For getting electricity connection, the country ranks 146 as against 175 a year earlier. An electricity
connection is acquired in 178.3 days per year and needs to endure five procedures.
In terms of cross-border trading, Pakistans ranking dropped to 108 as from 91 a year ago. Eight documents are required for exports.
Export time is 21 days with a container cost $765, while imports cost is $1,005.
For enforcing contracts, Pakistans ranking stands at 161 positions with 46 procedures and time requirement of 993.2 days. For credit
approval, the countrys ranking stands at 131.
A press statement of the World Bank said four of eight economies in South Asia implemented at least one regulatory reform, making it
easier for local entrepreneurs to do business in fiscal year 2013/14. Three countriesBangladesh, Nepal, and Pakistanfocused their
efforts on adopting modern electronic systems to facilitate business activity, said the statement.
The report, Doing Business 2015: Going Beyond Efficiency finds since 2005, all economies in the region have taken steps to improve
the business environment in areas measured by the report. India implemented the regions largest number of regulatory reforms with 20
followed by Sri Lanka with 16.
Doing business is easier in economies with administrative efficiency and strong regulatory protections, said the report lead author Rita
Ramalho. We are encouraged by the modernization of regulatory processes in South Asia because it is benefiting local entrepreneurs.
In Nepal, for example, a businesswoman trying to build a new warehouse nine years ago would have spent 143 days on the
construction permitting process.
Thanks to the adoption of some of the best global practices, such as a new electronic building permit system in 2013/14, this process
can now be completed in 86 days.
The report finds India set the pace for regulatory reform in the region in the last fiscal year. It made starting a business easier by
reducing registration fees and strengthened minority investor protections. And, the electricity utility in Mumbai made getting a new
connection less costly by reducing the security deposit. Bangladesh and Pakistan made trading across borders easier by implementing
computerised systems that allow web-based submission of documents, reducing the time to export and import.
This years report, for the first time, collected data for a second city in economies with a population of more than 100 million. It analyses
business regulations in Chittagong, Dhaka, Delhi, Mumbai, Lahore and Karachi.
According to the findings, differences between cities are common in indicators measuring the steps, time, and cost to complete
regulatory transactions where local agencies play a larger role.
This year, the authors expanded the data for three of the 10 topics covered, and there are plans to do so for five more topics next year.
In addition, the ease of doing business ranking is now based on the distance to frontier score. This measure shows how close each
economy is to global best practices in business regulation. A higher score indicates a more efficient business environment and stronger
legal institutions.
Singapore tops the global ranking on the ease of doing business. Joining it on the list of the top 10 economies with the most businessfriendly regulatory environments are New Zealand, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China, Denmark, the Republic of Korea,
Norway, the United States, the United Kingdom, Finland and Australia.
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10/31/2014

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