Poor infrastructure blamed
Bangladesh was demoted one place from the last year’s ranking among 139 countries in the global Competitiveness Report 2009-10 of the World Economic Forum, thanks to the country’s poor infrastructure.
Besides, the Geneva based organisation was told by the local businessmen that the level of corruption increased and the government was not maintaining criteria in awarding public sector deals.
The businessmen also viewed that independence of the newspapers was affected last year while the practice of bribe increased which also forced the country to slip to 107 place from previous 106.
The WEF prepares the report for many years on the basis of information given by the businessmen on prevailing business situation in their respective countries.
Some 90 local industrialists, bankers and entrepreneurs who have assets worth Tk 10 crore each, took part in the opinion poll held between February 2009 and April 2009.
Local think-tank Centre for policy Dialogue which helped the WEF during the opinion poll released the report in the capital on Thursday.
The present elected government after assuming power in early 2009 has taken many plans to overcome energy crises and improve the transport facilities. But translating those plans into reality was doubtful, the businessmen observed.
CPD executive director Mustifizur Rahman said Bangladesh had done well in the areas of heath, education and macro-economy, but failed to avoid the demotion because of chronic shortages of energy and poor transport facilities.
In the area of infrastructure, the country was placed among the last ten countries, he said.
Besides, the WEF found no significant improvement in the institutions like the Anti-Corruption Commission, the Board of Investment and the National Board of Revenue.
The WEF report, released globally on September 9, also found weakness in adoption of modern technologies in Bangladesh.
Institutions, infrastructure, macro-economic environment, education, heath are among the dozen of criteria upon which the report was prepared.
Switzerland retains the top position in overall ranking. The United States fell two places to the fourth position, overtaken by Sweden (second) and Singapore (third).
The Nordic countries continued to be well positioned in the ranking, with Sweden (seventh), Finland (eighth) and Denmark (ninth) among the top 10, and with Norway at 14th. The United Kingdom, after falling in the rankings over recent years, moved back up by one place to 12th position.
According to the report, China continued to lead the way among large developing economies, improving by two places this year and joining the top 30. India dropped two places and is now at 51.
Sri Lanka showed a remarkable improvement of 17 places and is now ranked 62. Pakistan ranked 123rd place.
