Why did the World Bank suspend the ‘Ease of Doing Business’ report?

The “Ease of Doing Business” report was jointly created by Simeon Djankov and Gerhard Pohl, two leading economists at the Central and Eastern Europe sector of the World Bank Group. The project started in November 2001. The immense process of data gathering includes 12,500 experts contributors covering 190 countries. The report is generated on the basis of a number of indexes some of which includes, starting a business, registering property, getting credit, getting electricity, paying taxes, dealing with construction permits and etc. Ease of doing business index plays an important role in getting investments for startups and plays a major role in the economy of any country. A country with good ratings will attract more business to set up a plant and branch in their country. It will also attract local people to start new businesses. However, recently the world bank in a statement stated that a number of irregularities have been found in the data of doing business report 2018 and 2020 which was published in October 2017 and 2019 respectively. The changes in the index data were inconsistent with the doing business methodology. The bank has assured to probe into the detail more retrospectively and till then it will suspend the report. The world bank also stated that the revised data may affect the rankings of the five countries. The latest report showed vast improvement in the middle eastern economies with Saudi Arabia climbing 30 places.

Month: Current Affairs - September, 2020