Nepal has made a remarkable progress in the doing business performance by climbing 16 positions up in the global ranking. The World Bank’s flagship publication Doing Business 2020 report that was published Thursday showed that Nepal mounted to 94th position among 190 economies in the world this year from last year’s ranking of 110. As per the report, the country achieved 63.2 score in 100 as compared to last year’s 59.7. The country was able to reduce the time and cost to export and import by opening the Integrated Check Post (ICP) in Birgunj. The ICP facility has been instrumental in facilitating export and import. Birgunj is the country’s largest trading hub. The report added that in Nepal the time to import border compliance was reduced significantly from 58 to 11 hours, while time to export border compliance was cut from 30 to 11 hours. The country had made zero reforms last year. However, Nepal made four reforms to be the third best reformer in the South Asian region this year.

India has topped the ranking in South Asia with its 63rd global position followed by Bhutan (89), Nepal (94), Sri Lanka (99), Pakistan (108), the Maldives (147), Bangladesh (168) and Afghanistan (173). India made the process of obtaining a building permit more efficient and upgraded port infrastructure. According to a news report published in this daily the other day, Nepal has reformed an online e-submission platform for construction permits and enhanced the quality of land administration by publishing official service standards for delivering updated cadastral maps. The country has also reformed the commercial judicial system by introducing time standards for important court events. The report, however, indicated that launching a business venture had become more difficult due to the introduction of an online employee registration with in-person follow-up for social security. Besides, fees for property transfer registration have also been raised in Nepal.

Four South Asian nations-- Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Pakistan—have reformed in one or more areas in starting a business, dealing with construction permits and trading across borders. New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong, Denmark, South Korea, the United States of America, Georgia, United Kingdom, Norway and Sweden are the best 10 countries worldwide in terms of doing business. The report has portrayed Somalia, Eritrea, Venezuela, Yemen, Libya, South Sudan, Central African Republic, Congo, Chad and Timor-Leste as the worst 10 economies for doing business.

With an improved business climate, Nepal is expected to attract more foreign investments. The country is in dire need of a huge investment for building up physical infrastructures like roads and airports and boosting economic sectors such as agriculture, tourism, hydropower and cottage and manufacturing industries. However, the country has a long way to go to take the position of top 10 most improved economies while India and Pakistan have taken these spots among the best improved nations. The country needs to take the issues raised by the report into serious consideration and step up measures to further improve them in coming years.