Botswana has climbed up one notch in the global competiveness rankings of the Geneva-based World Economic Forum, landing in 79th spot out of 144 countries.
The government achieved strides in addressing business costs of crime and violence and market efficiency but there are still flaws in a number of areas.
In a media briefing, the Minister of Trade and Industry, Dorcus Makgato Malesu, noted the pace by which the country climbed up by one rank.
This is mainly on account of the strength of the institutional pillar of the country, ranked 33 compared to 77 last year. The pillar includes factors such as property rights, intellectual property protection, diversion of public funds.
The report indicated that factor on business costs of crime and violence has improved in ranking from 68 last year to 59 this year. In terms of good market efficiency, Botswana is ranked, 78 compared to 133 in 2011-2012, owing to competitive tax rates and improved agriculture policies.
Malesu said the factor on the ease of starting a business, which includes health and environment inspections, remains a concern. This placed the country in an unfavorable position internationally, with a ranking of 131 compared to 128 last year.
The country seems to be doing relatively well in the financial market efficiency pillar having moved from 83 to 60 in the current report.
Factors on the hiring and firing practices remain a challenge, having regressed from 101 to 123 and 65 to 113, respectively, in this year’s report. A mix of factors that continue to erode the country’s competitive ranking are pillars of technological readiness, ranked 106, market size ranked (97) and business sophistication (95) compared to last year’s 84, 98,119, respectively.
The top four factors identified as the most problematic factors for doing business in the country remain as poor work ethic in national labour force, access to finance, inadequately educated work force and inefficient government bureaucracy.
“For the fifth consecutive year, poor work ethic in the national labour force is regarded by businessmen as the most problematic factor for doing business in the country,” said Malesu.
She, however, added that it is worth noting that the pillars on infrastructure, macroeconomic environment, health and primary education have shown a slight improvement compared to last year.
Generally, Botswana is doing well in some indicators, like availability of latest technology, firm-level technology absorption and FDI. However, the rankings show that many countries are more technologically advanced than Botswana.
Malesu said a number of legislative reforms are being formulated with others under review. These include income tax act and the town and country planning. The theme of this year competiveness report is ‘Strengthening Recovery by Rising Productivity’.
