NAMIBIA has dropped 11 places in the Global Competitiveness Report rankings, from 52nd in 2004 to 63rd this year. This places Namibia in the bottom half of the 117 countries ranked.
The World Economic Forum (WEF), which has been producing the global competitiveness report for the past 26 years, released its latest report in Geneva last week. The founder and Executive Chairman of the WEF, Klaus Schwab, said among sub-Saharan countries, Namibia – a relatively good performer previously – was one of the worst performers this year as it lost 11 places over the past year.Madagascar (at 107) and Zimbabwe (at 109) went down 11 and 10 places respectively.Tunisia was the highest-ranked African country, two places ahead of South Africa at 40.Namibia was in seventh position out of the 23 ranked African countries, after Tunisia, South Africa, Botswana, Mauritius, Egypt and Ghana.Local economist and Chief Executive Officer of Old Mutual Namibia, Johannes !Gawaxab, said it was noted in the report that Namibia had gone down in the rankings because of too much red-tape when one intends to conduct business in Namibia, favouritism by Government officials and a rise in corruption.He added that this would affect the country negatively, as it was clear that the country was becoming less competitive due to the mentioned factors.Namibia, said !Gawaxab, had to start focusing on secondary economic sectors like manufacturing to create more jobs and alleviate poverty, which would result in economic growth.While most African countries were less competitive, the region did score successes in South Africa, ranked at 42, Botswana (48), Mauritius (52) and Ghana at 59, having moved up nine places from its 2004 position.Tanzania made significant strides to go up 11 places to 71.Schwab cited Zimbabwe as a “sad case”, saying the country’s quick descent to the bottom of the rankings reflected the continued deterioration of the political and economic climate of that country.Nordic countries and the popular East Asian ‘tigers’ of Taiwan (5) and Singapore (6) made up the top 10, which saw Finland remaining in pole position, while the United States and Sweden maintained their second and third positions respectively.The rest of the top 10 is made up of Denmark (4), Iceland (7), Switzerland (8), Norway (9) and Australia at position 10.At the bottom of the list is Chad at number 117.Schwab said negatives varying from widespread mismanagement to corruption, favouritism of government officials in policy-making and procurement decisions and disappearance of property rights led to strong deterioration in most areas measured by the index.The rankings are drawn from a combination of hard data, publicly available for each of the economies studied, and the results of an executive opinion survey done by the WEF together with partner institutes in the countries covered by the report.This year, nearly 11 000 business leaders were polled in the 117 economies worldwide.The survey questionnaire is designed to capture a broad range of factors affecting an economy’s business environment that are key determinants of sustained economic growth.Focus is placed on elements of the macroeconomic environment, the quality of public institutions which underpin the development process, and the level of technological readiness and innovation.The founder and Executive Chairman of the WEF, Klaus Schwab, said among sub-Saharan countries, Namibia – a relatively good performer previously – was one of the worst performers this year as it lost 11 places over the past year.Madagascar (at 107) and Zimbabwe (at 109) went down 11 and 10 places respectively.Tunisia was the highest-ranked African country, two places ahead of South Africa at 40.Namibia was in seventh position out of the 23 ranked African countries, after Tunisia, South Africa, Botswana, Mauritius, Egypt and Ghana.Local economist and Chief Executive Officer of Old Mutual Namibia, Johannes !Gawaxab, said it was noted in the report that Namibia had gone down in the rankings because of too much red-tape when one intends to conduct business in Namibia, favouritism by Government officials and a rise in corruption.He added that this would affect the country negatively, as it was clear that the country was becoming less competitive due to the mentioned factors.Namibia, said !Gawaxab, had to start focusing on secondary economic sectors like manufacturing to create more jobs and alleviate poverty, which would result in economic growth.While most African countries were less competitive, the region did score successes in South Africa, ranked at 42, Botswana (48), Mauritius (52) and Ghana at 59, having moved up nine places from its 2004 position.Tanzania made significant strides to go up 11 places to 71.Schwab cited Zimbabwe as a “sad case”, saying the country’s quick descent to the bottom of the rankings reflected the continued deterioration of the political and economic climate of that country.Nordic countries and the popular East Asian ‘tigers’ of Taiwan (5) and Singapore (6) made up the top 10, which saw Finland remaining in pole position, while the United States and Sweden maintained their second and third positions respectively. The rest of the top 10 is made up of Denmark (4), Iceland (7), Switzerland (8), Norway (9) and Australia at position 10.At the bottom of the list is Chad at number 117.Schwab said negatives varying from widespread mismanagement to corruption, favouritism of government officials in policy-making and procurement decisions and disappearance of property rights led to strong deterioration in most areas measured by the index.The rankings are drawn from a combination of hard data, publicly available for each of the economies studied, and the results of an executive opinion survey done by the WEF together with partner institutes in the countries covered by the report.This year, nearly 11 000 business leaders were polled in the 117 economies worldwide.The survey questionnaire is designed to capture a broad range of factors affecting an economy’s business environment that are key determinants of sustained economic growth.Focus is placed on elements of the macroeconomic environment, the quality of public institutions which underpin the development process, and the level of technological readiness and innovation.
