Saudi Arabia sees most improvement in ease of doing business: World Bank

Arab News
October 25, 2019

Riyadh, Oct 25: Saudi Arabia is the most improved country in the world for doing business, the World Bank said on Thursday. The Kingdom leapt 30 places in the annual survey of business efficiency in 190 countries, and was the top reforming country — the highest ranking since the bank launched its “Doing Business” survey 20 years ago.

The country now ranks 62nd in the world, ahead of many larger economies such as India, and it has introduced more reforms than China or Pakistan.

“Today, Saudi Arabia is celebrating,” Commerce and Investment Minister Majid Al-Qasabi said at the launch of the report in Riyadh. “And it is the outcome of tremendous efforts since the launch of Vision 2030.”

Simeon Djankov, the World Bank executive responsible for the report, said Saudi reformers had shown that “things that seemed impossible can be possible. Now the job remains to convince the rest of the world so they understand Saudi Arabia is open for business.”

“Something clearly is happening in the Gulf which has not happened before,” Djankov said.

The report ranked countries on their business climates, and found that the most improved countries over the previous year were in the Middle East – including Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Bahrain, and Kuwait.

“Achieving Aramco IPO is the single most important thing Saudi Arabia can do to improve its global business image," Djankov told Arab News. The time taken to start a business had been dramatically reduced and new online systems had speeded up export-import commerce, Djankov said. He also praised efforts to include more women in the workforce.

“A nation prospers when all its citizens benefit,” he said. “There are many areas in Saudi Arabia where women are on a par with men now, and the world should know about it.Thursday’s event also marked the inauguration of the National Competitiveness Centre, Tayseer, which will drive the Kingdom’s progress in business reform. Assistant Commerce Minister Iman Al-Mutairi, CEO of National Competitive Center (NCC), said the World Bank report was a “quantum leap” for the business community.

Saudi Arabia launched reforms in eight areas monitored by the World Bank, more than any other country. The report, based on interviews with 50,000 global private-sector executives, found the Kingdom had made the greatest progress in the area of business start-up. “It now costs only 5.4 percent of income per capita for an entrepreneur to start a business, which is lower than the Middle East and North Africa regional average of 16.7 per cent,” it said.

There has also been significant improvement in areas such as registry property and construction permits, and in the ease of obtaining electricity connections.

“Saudi Arabia’s impressive reforms … show its commitment to fulfilling a main pillar of its Vision 2030: A thriving economy,” said Issam Abousleiman, the World Bank’s GCC regional director.

Djankov said the Kingdom must now press on with reforms. “Why not repeat this performance next year, and the year after? The aim should be to be a better place to do business than Germany, France or the UK.” The World Bank said Saudi Arabia’s reforms included establishing a one-stop-shop for business registration, introducing a secured transactions law and an insolvency law, improving protections for minority investors, and measures to bring more women into the workforce.

“Everybody here in this region figured out we better diversify the economy in some direction and I think this is actually why the reforms are happening now,” he added.

The report coincides with the scheduled appearance of World Bank President David Malpass at a Saudi investment conference next week. The US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and presidential adviser Jared Kushner would also attend the conference.

“Removing barriers facing entrepreneurs generates better jobs, more tax revenues, and higher incomes, all of which are necessary to reduce poverty and raise living standards,” Malpass said in a statement.

The top 10 rankings in the survey were largely unchanged from a year ago, with New Zealand holding its top spot, followed by Singapore, Hong Kong, Denmark, South Korea, the United States, Georgia, Britain, Norway and Sweden.

Latin American countries lagged in the rankings, with Argentina falling seven places to 126th, and Mexico, the region’s highest-ranking economy, falling six spots to 60th.

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News Network
November 4,2024

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Hundreds of Israeli settlers conducted a brutal attack in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah.

The settlers set fire to numerous homes and vehicles of Palestinians and then moved to the main road connecting Ramallah to other cities, targeting Palestinian cars passing by.

They stormed the city of al-Bireh, near Ramallah, and burned Palestinian property and vehicles.

A woman sustained injuries after the settlers hurled stones at her vehicle, according to Palestinian news outlets.

Tension has been running high across the West Bank because of Israel’s genocidal war in the Gaza Strip, which has killed at least 43,341 people, mostly women and children, since last year’s October.

The Monday settler attack came as the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas warned of Israel’s plans to annex the West Bank and drive Palestinians out.

“We warn of the grave danger posed by the plans led by the extremist occupation regime and illegal settler groups to displace the residents of Palestinian villages in the occupied West Bank,” Hamas official Mahmoud Mardawi said.

Israel's far-right minister Bezalel Smotrich called for the full annexation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip last week.

Smotrich asserted that Israel should unequivocally declare there would be no Palestinian state.

He repeated his proposal of expanding Israeli settlements within the West Bank and other occupied territories.

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News Network
November 15,2024

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Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) has killed or captured 69 terrorists linked to the Israeli spy agency Mossad during a major counterterrorism drill in the country's southeast, its spokesman says.  

General Ahmad Shafaei, the spokesman for the “Martyrs of Security” drill, said Friday that a total of 23 terrorists have been killed and another 46 arrested in various clean-up operations ever since the IRGC Ground Force launched it in the Sistan and Baluchestan province on November 1.

Seven terrorists have also turned themselves in during the period.

“The undeniable fact about terrorists is that they rely on arrogant powers, particularly the intelligence service of the wicked and vicious Zionist regime," Shafaei said.

“Unfortunately, weapons and munitions at terrorists’ disposal are among the most sophisticated ones in the world. This accounts for their heavy dependence.” 

The official stated that several members of the disbanded terror teams were non-Iranian nationals, who had been hired by foreign intelligence agencies to carry out acts of sabotage and terror inside Iran.

In a most recent operation, six terrorists were arrested and four others were eliminated, three of whom were non-Iranians, he added. 

On October 26, ten members of Iran's law enforcement forces were killed in a terrorist attack in the Gohar Kuh district of Taftan in the Sistan and Baluchestan province.

The so-called Jaish al-Adl terrorist group claimed responsibility for the assault, which was one of the deadliest in the province in recent months.

The group has carried out numerous terrorist attacks in Iran, primarily in Sistan and Baluchestan.

Its tactics include the abduction of border guards as well as targeting civilians and police stations within the province to incite chaos and disorder.

In January, Iran launched a military operation during which the headquarters of the Pakistan-based terrorist group was targeted in missile strikes, destroying its infrastructure.

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News Network
November 13,2024

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Beirut: The Israeli army on Tuesday continued to launch attacks against civilians in Lebanon, targeting them in several areas without prior evacuation warnings.

However, 13 airstrikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs in the space of only three hours were preceded by evacuation warnings.

The attacks caused no injuries but resulted in widespread destruction of residential buildings and commercial, medical and educational centers.

The airstrikes in southern Lebanon and Bekaa region, reaching Akkar in Lebanon’s far north, erased any hope of a near-term ceasefire settlement.

The strikes were accompanied by an announcement on Israel’s Channel 14 that “the Israeli army has expanded its operations in southern Lebanon to areas it had not reached since the beginning of the ground operation.”

About 50 days have passed since Israel intensified its hostile operations in Lebanon targeting Hezbollah. The death toll from these confrontations and attacks has passed 3,200, with more than 14,000 wounded.

For the first time, an airstrike targeted a mountainous area between Baalchmay and Aabadiyeh on the road leading to Aley, destroying a building housing displaced people.

The mayor of Baalchmay, Adham Al-Danaf, confirmed that “the airstrike targeted a residential building in the Dhour Aabadiyeh area.”

The initial toll from the Ministry of Health showed “five people killed and two injured.”

The raids that targeted Beirut’s southern suburbs for the first time in the morning, unlike nightly raids before, caused huge destruction. Those who evacuated their homes after Israeli warnings, used their phones to record the collapse of empty buildings in Sfeir, Haret Hreik, Bir Al-Abed, Mrayjeh, Laylaki and Hadath.

Israeli warplanes also targeted Tyre, where a strike on a building killed three people and injured many others, while a raid on Tefahta killed a man identified as Kifah Khalil and his family.

Attacks were widespread, with Yater and Zebqine subject to artillery shelling, a civilian being killed in Hermel, and further attacks on Bouday and an area between the towns of Srifa and Arsoun.

A raid on the town of Siddiqin killed two people and injured several others, while an attack on the Mechref farm led to one fatality and multiple injuries.

The search for those missing after an Israeli raid on the town of Ain Yaacoub in Akkar, in the northernmost part of Lebanon, continued until dawn.

During the operation, 14 bodies were retrieved, identified as those of residents displaced from the town of Arabsalim in the Iqlim Al-Tuffah area of the south, along with members of a Syrian family, a mother and three of her children. Additionally, there were 10 people in critical condition.

The targeted residence belongs to a Lebanese citizen, Hussein Hashim, who is reported to be a member of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party.

An airstrike on the town of Saksakiyeh in the Sidon region on Monday night resulted in yet another tragedy.

It appeared that the intended target was the Shoumer family, who just days before lost Hussein Amin Shoumer and his two sisters in a drone strike near Al-Awali River.

Israeli army spokesperson Avichay Adraee issued additional evacuation warnings for towns in the southern region along the Litani River, which, according to estimates from the mayors, are currently 90 percent uninhabited.

In the meantime, Hezbollah announced its continued efforts to “combat the intrusions of Israeli forces and to strike military installations and towns in the north.”

Hezbollah said in a statement that it confronted “an Israeli Hermes 450 drone in the airspace of Nabatieh and forced it to leave Lebanese airspace.”

The party also announced that it targeted “Kfar Blum settlement with a rocket salvo.”

On the Israeli side, air raid sirens sounded in areas of Upper and Western Galilee and in the town of Kiryat Shmona and its surroundings.

The Israeli army confirmed that “a drone exploded in Nesher, east of Haifa, without activating the air raid sirens,” and that “a drone launched from Lebanon crashed into a school in Gesher HaZiv, north of Nahariya.”

Israel’s Channel 13 reported the Israeli military’s assessment regarding Hezbollah’s military strength, claiming that the group currently possesses approximately 100 precision missiles, thousands of artillery shells, and hundreds of rockets. Additionally, it was highlighted that “there are around 200 Lebanese towns that remain unvisited.”

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