Ease of Doing Business 2016

Jamaica, a better place to do business in 2016

By Paul Burrowes

StatsPac

In the latest Ease of Doing Business Report just released, Jamaica moved up seven places to 64 from last year's ranking.
Doing Business 2016, published by the World Bank, examined 10 topics of the 189 economies summarized.
They are starting a business, dealing with construction permits, getting electricity, registering property, getting credit, protecting minority investors, paying taxes, trading across borders, enforcing contracts, and resolving insolvency.

Biggest improvements 

Jamaica's biggest improvement of the 10 topics was resolving insolvency, which increased by 25 places.
The five other areas of improvement, which improved the country's overall ranking, was dealing with construction permits, starting a business, paying taxes, getting credit, and registering property.
Grouped in Latin America and the Caribbean, Jamaica is an upper middle-income country with a population of 2,721,252 and a GNI per capita of US$5,042.
While there was no change in enforcing contracts, compared to 2015, Jamaica lost 13 places in getting electricity, three places in protecting minority investors, and one place in trading across borders.
In the second section of Doing Business, called Distance to Frontier, Jamaica got good marks for resolving insolvency and getting credit.
For more information, visit doingbusiness.org.
These are the top 10 countries for Doing Business in 2016.
1 Singapore
2 New Zealand
3 Denmark
4 Korea, Rep
5 Hong Kong
6 United Kingdom
7 United States
8 Sweden
9 Norway
10 Finland
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34 Japan
57 Puerto Rico
61 Greece
62 Rwanda
64 Jamaica

In Latin America and the Caribbean region, Jamaica is ranked at number six, with the World Bank acknowledging that Mexico (1), Colombia (3), and Costa Rica (5) have sub-national data available.
Peru is number two and Puerto Rico, number four.
Jamaica was one of the top 10 performers for the 2014-15 period under review. The others are Costa Rica, Uganda, Kenya, Cyprus, Mauritania, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Senegal and Benin.
According to Doing Business, these countries together implemented 39 regulatory reforms making it easier to do business.

Limitations

The Doing Business methodology has limitations. Other areas important to business — such as an economy’s proximity to large markets, the quality of its infrastructure services (other than those related to trading across borders and getting electricity), the security of property from theft and looting, the transparency of government procurement, macroeconomic conditions or the underlying strength of institutions — are not directly studied by Doing Business. 
The indicators refer to a specific type of business, generally a local limited liability company operating in the largest business city. 
Because standard assumptions are used in the data collection, comparisons and benchmarks are valid across economies. The data not only highlight the extent of obstacles to doing business; 
they also help identify the source of those obstacles, supporting policy makers in designing regulatory reform.