Aquila Network Blog

The World Bank has released their annual report on Doing Business. This report is “a guide for evaluating regulations that directly impact economic growth, downloading underlying laws, making cross-country comparisons, and identifying good practice reforms.”

For anyone looking to start a business overseas, this is a HUGE resource. The report ranks countries across a variety of factors in order to evaluate the “ease of doing business”. Getting licenses, hiring employees, getting credit, paying taxes, and enforcing contracts are just a handful of the evaluated categories.
Singapore currently ranks as the “easiest” place to do business, with the Democratic Republic of Congo bringing up the rear. Egypt was the greatest reformer, making the most changes to ease the flow of business in their country.

You can read an overview of the 2008 report here (PDF link) and can also download a full version of the report off the Doing Business website.