Washington, D.C.,
October 29, 2014 — A
new World Bank Group report finds that Greece’s standing on the ease of doing
business continues to improve. With the report’s expansion of
several indicator sets and change in the ranking system factored in, Greece’s
doing business rank is now 61. This reflects a regulatory framework for local
entrepreneurs that is gradually aligning itself with other OECD high-income
economies.
Released today, Doing Business
2015: Going Beyond Efficiency shows that Greece made
registering property easier by reducing the property transfer tax and
eliminating the requirement for a municipal tax clearance certificate. The
reform enabled the country to record the most progress globally in the registering property indicator. Last year, Greece was the
top improver globally in starting a business in 2012/13.
In
addition to property registration, Greece made business incorporation easier over
the past year by lowering registration
costs so that starting a business now costs 2.2 percent of income per capita, down
from 32.5 percent a decade ago. In addition, Greece strengthened
legal institutions by introducing an electronic filling system for court users.
“Greece,
Italy, Portugal, and Spain—all among the economies most adversely affected by
the global financial crisis—have maintained a steady pace of regulatory reforms,” said Laura Tuck, World
Bank Vice President for the Europe & Central Asia Region. “Such reforms can help restore economic
growth. In Greece, for instance, by easing business incorporation in the past
year, entrepreneurial ideas are now more likely to florish and create local employment
opportunities.”
Since 2005, the Doing Business project
shows that Greece has implemented 20 reforms, making it easier for
local entrepreneurs to do
business. This gives Greece the fourth largest number of reforms in OECD high-income
countries during that period, after Portugal, Czech Republic, and Poland.
Challenges persist, however, particularly in the area of enforcing contracts. For
instance, it takes on average 1,580 days to resolve a commercial dispute in
Greece – more than in any other European economy.
The
report this year expands the data for three of the ten 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. The measure provides a more precise view of each
economy’s regulatory performance and its improvement over time.
The report finds that Singapore tops the global ranking on the
ease of doing business. Joining it on the list of the top ten economies with
the most business-friendly regulatory environments are New Zealand; Hong Kong
SAR, China; Denmark; the Republic of Korea; Norway; the United States; the
United Kingdom; Finland; and Australia.
About the Doing Business report series...
The annual World Bank Group flagship Doing Business report
analyzes regulations that apply to an economy’s businesses during their life
cycle, including start-up and operations, trading across borders, paying taxes,
and resolving insolvency. The aggregate ease of doing business rankings are
based on the distance to frontier scores for ten topics and cover 189
economies. Doing Business does not measure all aspects of the business
environment that matter to firms and investors. For example, it does not
measure the quality of fiscal management, other aspects of macroeconomic
stability, the level of skills in the labor force, or the resilience of
financial systems. Its findings have stimulated policy debates worldwide and
enabled a growing body of research on how firm-level regulation relates to
economic outcomes across economies. Each year the report team works to improve
the methodology and to enhance their data collection, analysis and output. The
project has benefited from feedback from many stakeholders over the years. With
a key goal to provide an objective basis for understanding and improving the
local regulatory environment for business around the world, the project goes
through rigorous reviews to ensure its quality and effectiveness. This year’s
report marks the 12th edition of the global Doing
Business report series. For more information about the Doing Business reports, please visit doingbusiness.org and join us
on doingbusiness.org/Facebook.
About the World Bank Group
The World Bank Group plays a key
role in the global effort to end extreme poverty and boost shared prosperity.
It consists of five institutions: the World Bank, including the International
Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and the International
Development Association (IDA); the International Finance Corporation (IFC); the
Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA); and the International Centre
for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID). Working together in more than
100 countries, these institutions provide financing, advice, and other
solutions that enable countries to address the most urgent challenges of
development. For more information, please visit www.worldbank.org, www.miga.org,
and www.ifc.org.
