Estonia has ranked 16th in the World Bank’s ease of doing business index, placing right after Germany and before Ireland.
The ease of doing business index is topped by Singapore, which is, in turn, followed by New Zealand and Denmark. South Korea ranks fourth and Hong Kong fifth.
In the World Bank’s index, economies are ranked on their ease of doing business, from 1–189. “A high ease of doing business ranking means the regulatory environment is more conducive to the starting and operation of a local firm,” according to the World Bank. “The rankings are determined by sorting the aggregate distance to frontier scores on 10 topics, each consisting of several indicators, giving equal weight to each topic. The rankings for all economies are benchmarked to June 2015.”
Estonia ranks the highest in the registering property topic (fourth) and lowest in protecting minority investors (81st). In the topic of starting a business, Estonia ranks 15th, in getting credit 28th and in enforcing contracts 11th.
Eritrea ranks the lowest in the index (189th), preceded by Libya and South Sudan.
What comes to Estonia’s immediate neighbours, then Sweden ranks eighth, Finland 10th, Lithuania 20th, Latvia 22nd and Russia 51st.
In the last year’s index, Estonia scored the same as this time. A significant improvement occurred in the starting a business topic (from 25 to 15), the biggest decline in ranking was in the getting credit topic (from 24 to 28).
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Cover: A view to Tallinn skyline by Gen Vagula.
