Programme seeks to improve business, trade
“WE must commit to simplifying and streamlining existing regulations, behaviours, and practices that impact business and trade facilitation.”
This is according to Christopher Sinckler, Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs, who was speaking at the Closing Workshop for the Barbados Competitiveness Programme facilitated by that programme in collaboration with the Inter-American Development Bank at the Lloyd Erskine Sandiford Centre.
He acknowledged, “So it is no wonder then that domestic policymakers, domestic stakeholders in the local economy, international institutions and ultimately investors have and continue to focus their attention on Barbados’ international rankings according to two leading indices – the Global Competitiveness Index (GCI), published annually by the World Economic Forum (WEF) in its Global Competitiveness Report (GCR) and the Ease of Doing Business, also published annually by the World Bank in its Doing Business Report.
“There is justification in these concerns. Our Global Competitiveness ranking fell from 44th out of 144 economies surveyed in 2012-2013, to 55th out of 144 economies in 2014-2015, to 72nd out of 138 economies surveyed in 2016-2017.
“The Doing Business reports painted a similar picture. The 2013 edition ranked the ‘ease of doing business’ in Barbados 88th out of 180 countries surveyed in 2012. This position slipped progressively over the years and according to Doing Business 2017, Barbados was ranked 117th out of 190 countries overall in 2016, including a ranking of 125th in the specific area of ‘Trading across borders’.”
He added, “While we may be tempted to challenge certain aspects of these indices, including their sources of under-lying information and the universality of their methodologies, we cannot challenge the fact that as a country [we are] heavily dependent on international trade (over BDS$3 billion spent on imports since 2010) for domestic consumption and production. This is where the Barbados Competitiveness Programme comes in.” (NB)