Ready for Expo 2020: UAE tops Arab world in 'Ease of Doing Business' global report

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has jumped three slots this year to land at No. 23 in the world in the Ease of Doing Business report 2014, out of 189 economies ranked for this year’s report.

The country has wrested the highest ranking in the region and the Arab world and has done so by massively improving regulations to protect investors and a host of other business-critical parameters, according to the World Bank report.

“In the past year the United Arab Emirates strengthened investor protections, improved electricity access, and simplified property transfers,” said Augusto Lopez-Claros, Director, Global Indicators and Analysis, World Bank Group.

“Despite the challenges facing the Middle East and North Africa, several economies in the region continue to take steps to improve their business climate,” he said. “Djibouti adopted a new Commercial Code that has helped expand access to credit for firms and has made starting a business and resolving insolvency easier,” added Lopez-Claros.

The UAE stands tall in the Middle East and North Africa region in which, according to new World Bank Group report, the pace of business regulatory reform has slowed amid the unrest affecting the region. In the latest report, the UAE has surpassed GCC peer Saudi Arabia, which has dropped four slots in this year’s report to land at No. 26 globally, and No. 2 in the region, after the UAE.

“Governments find it increasingly challenging to keep up with reforms taking place in other regions of the world,” the report states.

Among the region’s economies, the UAE has the best business regulatory environment overall, as measured by the Doing Business indicators, the report highlights.

The UAE tops the Mena region on 5 of the 10 parameters on which the Ease of Doing Business report ranks the economies, and is second-placed on another 2 parameters. The UAE is the best place in the region in starting a business, getting electricity, registering property, [ease of] paying taxes, and trading across borders, while it is the second best regional economy in terms of dealing with construction permits (Bahrain is No. 1) and getting credit (Saudi Arabia is No. 1). 

The parameters on which country lags are protecting investors (No. 6 regionally), enforcing contracts (No. 7 regionally) and resolving insolvency (No. 10 regionally) although the UAE has made significant progress in protecting investors, jumping 39 slots on the parameter globally, from 137 to 98 this year. The country has also improved by one slot each on the enforcing contracts and resolving insolvency parameters although it remains globally at No. 100 and No. 101, respectively, on those parameters.

In a generally upbeat report for entrepreneurs, the Doing Business report finds out that governments around the world significantly stepped up their pace of improving business regulations in 114 economies last year – an 18 per cent jump from the previous year – laying the groundwork for local entrepreneurs to expand their work.

The report, released today, is the 11th in a series of annual reports on the ease of doing business, and it documented 238 business regulatory reforms worldwide last year.

Doing Business 2014: Understanding Regulations for Small and Medium-Size Enterprises finds that the pace of business regulatory reform continues to accelerate following the financial crisis of 2008-09.

The report says that if economies around the world were to follow best practices in regulatory processes for starting a business, entrepreneurs would spend 45 million fewer days each year satisfying bureaucratic requirements.

“A better business climate that enables entrepreneurs to build their businesses and reinvest in their communities is key to local and global economic growth,” said World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim.

“Doing Business shows that economies with better business regulations are more likely to empower local entrepreneurs to create more jobs – another step in the right direction toward ending extreme poverty by 2030.”

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