India 71 on Global Enabling Trade Report 2008

Islamabad, Jul 6: Pakistan has been ranked 84 among 118 countries on 'The Global Enabling Trade Report 2008' released by World Economic Forum Saturday, July 5. Sri Lanka secured 70 and India 71 as compared to Bangladesh 110 and Nepal 116, the report said.

Hong Kong and Singapore occupy the top two positions in the Enabling Trade Index ranking, followed by Sweden and Norway. Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Switzerland and New Zealand complete the top 10 list. Published for the first time and covering 118 economies worldwide, report 2008 aims to present a cross-country analysis of the large number of measures facilitating trade. The Enabling Trade Index captures the free flow of goods over borders and to destination.

The index breaks the enablers into four overall issue areas, market access, border administration, transport and communications infrastructure and the business environment.

Pakistan is lagging behind and has shown weaknesses in some of the crucial areas, Arthur Bayhan, chief executive officer of the Competitiveness Support Fund (CSF) said.

"Pakistan needs to put immediate attention to facilitate an environment conducive to trade and investment, including a transparent and efficient border administration, well developed transport infrastructure and highly efficient services".

He, however, said Pakistan showed its competitive advantage on the indicators such as non-tariff barriers, time for import, transshipment connectivity index, which is the types of transshipment connections available to shippers from Pakistan on bilateral routes, quality of rail road infrastructure, road congestions, linear shipping connectivity index and ease of hiring and firing labour.

According to the Daily Times, the survey provides unique data on many qualitative institutional and business environment issues and the perception of the private sector on various aspects of the economy.

ANI