UAE leads Gulf in World Bank’s ease of business ranking; Saudi top reformer

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) emerged as the top destination among Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries for its ease of doing business, according to a recent World Bank report.

Saudi Arabia led the reform efforts among the Gulf states to improve business climate and competitiveness, carrying out six reforms over the past year, the World Bank’s ‘Doing Business 2018: Reforming to Create Jobs’ report showed.

“In the global ranking stakes for the ease of doing business, UAE, in 21st place, is the top-ranked economy in the GCC, followed by Bahrain (66), Oman (71), Qatar (83), Saudi Arabia (92) and Kuwait (96),” the report said.

Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, was placed among the top 20 reformers in the world, and was ranked second best reformer among high-income and G20 countries, according to the report.

Over the past year, Saudi Arabia improved the efficiency of the land administration system to streamline the property registration process.

“As a result, Saudi Arabia has an efficient land registry and it takes only 1.5 days to transfer property, at no cost,” the report said. “In contrast, it takes more than 22 days and costs 4.2 percent of the property value on average across OECD high-income economies.”

The report also notes the Kingdom’s effort to strengthen minority investor protections by increasing shareholder rights and role in major decisions, clarifying ownership and control structures, requiring greater corporate transparency and regulating the disclosure of transactions.

“This reform brought Saudi Arabia to number 10 globally, which should send a strong signal to investors interested to invest in the Kingdom,” the World Bank said.

Other reforms that the country has implemented include: Making payment of taxes easier by improving its online platform, and increasing the ease of trading across borders by reducing the number of documents required for customs clearance.

In total, GCC states carried out 15 reforms over the past year, with the United Arab Emirates implementing four reforms. Kuwait and Qatar adopted two reforms each, while Oman carried out one.

The Gulf states have made 103 reforms in the past 15 years, accounting for more than a third of all reforms implemented in the Middle East and North Africa region, the report said.

“With their commitment to develop the private sector, the GCC states have done much to improve the business climate for private enterprises,” Nadir Mohammed, regional director for GCC countries, said in the report.

The reforms made by the UAE over the past year include strengthening construction quality control – which earned the country the highest possible score on the building quality control index. Also, the country improved access to credit information by providing consumer credit scores to banks and financial institutions, the report said.

In the area of “getting electricity,” the UAE achieved global leader status, World Bank said.

“It takes 10 days to obtain an electricity connection in the UAE, compared to the global average of 92 days and the OECD high-income average of 78 days,” it added.