New Zealand is third in the world for the ease of doing business in a World Bank report.
Doing Business 2012: Doing Business in a More Transparent World assesses regulations affecting domestic firms in 183 economies and ranks the economies in 10 areas of business regulation, such as starting a business, resolving insolvency and trading across borders. This
year’s report data cover regulations measured from June 2010 through May 2011.
The report rankings on ease of doing business have expanded to include indicators on getting electricity. The report finds that getting an electrical connection is most efficient in Iceland; Germany; Taiwan, China; Hong Kong SAR, China; and Singapore.
The global report shows that governments in 125 economies out of 183 measured implemented a total of 245 business regulatory reforms—13 percent more reforms than in the previous year. In Sub-Saharan Africa, a record 36 out of 46 economies improved business regulations this year. Over the past six years, 163 economies have made their regulatory environment more business-friendly. China, India, and the Russian Federation are among the 30 economies that improved the most over time.
This year, Singapore led on the overall ease of doing business, followed by Hong Kong SAR, China; New Zealand; the United States; and Denmark. The Republic of Korea was a new entrant to the top 10. The 12 economies that have improved the ease of doing business the most across several areas of regulation as measured by the report are Morocco, Moldova, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, São Tomé and Príncipe, Latvia, Cape Verde, Sierra Leone, Burundi, the Solomon Islands, the Republic of Korea, Armenia, and Colombia. Two-thirds are low- or lower-middle-income economies.
At a time when persistent unemployment and the need for job creation are in the headlines, governments around the world continue to seek ways to improve the regulatory climate for domestic business. Small and medium businesses that benefit most from these improvements are the key engines for job creation in many parts of the world,” said Augusto Lopez-Claros, Director, Global Indicators and Analysis, World Bank Group.
Take note Labour, the key engines for job creation are small and medium businesses which benefit from improvements in the regulatory climate.
That is the opposite of what will be achieved by Labour’s work and wages policy.
The rankings (with New Zealand’s place in brackets) were based on the ease of starting a business (1), dealing with construction (2) getting electricity (31), registering property (3), getting credit (4), protecting investors (1) , paying taxes (36) , trading across borders (27), enforcing contracts (10) and resolving insolvency (18).
We score worst for trading across borders, getting electricity and paying taxes.
Coming 36th, 31st and 27th respectively out of 183 isn’t bad but there is still a lot of room for improvement.
Homepaddock 
Do you think this is a good measure to throw at those who say ‘red tape is suffocating our economy’?
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This survey is rubbish for reasons I have explained before.
However, I think I recall our rating being just as high or higher under Labour, so how is this a positive reflection on National?
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Redbaiter rules! His comments cut through the crap like a hot knife though butter.
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The truth is NZ is a good place to do business, compared with many many countries.
This truth has been in place since the early 1990’s as a result of Roger Douglas (since much maligned) reforms, and the general political consensus around maintaining those reforms and the advantages they give NZ.
It seems from the recent Labour policy releases that they are now keen to abandon that consensus and take NZ back to the economic disaster that was the 1970’s and early 1980’s.
Given our small size, and distance from major markets we need to maintain our international competitiveness and attractiveness to business and doing business.
No-one in the world is waiting for us to ‘find’ ourselves and if we stuff it up, from other countries point of view, it is just one less good competitor that they have to deal with.
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Hey Ross! Is Redbaiter right where he recalls,
“our rating being just as high or higher under Labour”,
and asking a valid question when he asks,
“so how is this a positive reflection on National?”
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Robert, as I said above, the ease of business is a credit to the NZ Government, regardless of the stripe of political administration and reflects the result of long standing policy direction.
What Labour are proposing as policy this election is concerning, as it would be a significant negative change on this ranking, and the associated ease of business in this country.
So, in summary I think that to date this is a positive reflection on both Labour and National administrations over the past 2 decades.
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Very fair of you, Ross (aside from your ‘prediction’).
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