Thailand moved up 6 places from from 27thposition to take the 21st spot in the 2020 Ease of Doing Business (EODB) rankings as reported by the World Bank.
The overall rankingsare based on a score of between 0 and 100 for each country where 0 represents the least success and 100 represents the best possible achievement.
Overall Thailand scored 80.1, up from 79.5 last year. This was enough to secure the advance of 6 places. Indeed it was a tight race with Malaysia scoring just a little higher at 81.50, but at the same time securing 12th position in the rankings.
New Zealand took the top spot globally gaining a score of 86.8, with Singapore a close second at 86.2. Hong Kong and Denmark came in at 3rd and fourth position both with a score of 85.2 followed by South Korea and the US in 5th and 6th places with a score of 84.0 each. The holders of the top 5 positions in 2020 remain the same as those in the previous year. The other four spots in the top ten were taken by Georgia in 7th place with a score of 83.7, the UK in 8th Place with a score of 83.5, Norway in 9th position with a score of 82.6 and Sweden in the 10th spot with a score of 82.0.
In the main, The EODB rankings are based on 10 separate “ease of” sub-sectors that are also rated from 0 to 100 on the same basis as the main index.
These subsectors are: starting a business, dealing with construction permits, getting credit, getting electricity, registering property, paying taxes, trading across borders, ability to enforce contracts, resolving insolvency, and protection of minority interests.
Thailand scored 92.4 for the subsector of starting a business and 98.7 for getting electricity. It also scored well for trading across borders at 84.6 and protecting minority interests at 86, and indeed ranked 3rd in the world for this. Areas where improvement could be made was enforcing contracts, which garnered a score of 67.9, and registering property, which received a score of 69.5. Also, ease of getting credit came in with a score of only 70.
According to Finance Minister, Uttama Savanayana, Thailand’s success could be attributed to the government’s drive to promote the digital economy as well as incentives and infrastructure that are being laid out for the Eastern Economic Corridor EEC project.
Despite this year’s ranking increase, more will be done to make further improvements in coming years, to ensure Thailand takes a more commanding position of the index.
It is clear to see that just a small increase in score can allow for a large jump in the rankings. However the scores are quite competitive and it is the scoring activity in the sub-sectors that really count.
