The World Bank’s 2020 Doing Business Index (DBI) has ranked Nigeria 131 out of 190 countries, up 15 places from 146 position last year.
The report, which was released on Thursday also named Nigeria one of the top 10 most improved economies in the world for the second time in three years.
Dr. Jumoke Oduwole, Special Adviser to the President, and Secretary to the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council (PEBEC), said on Thursday that Nigeria was one of the only two African countries to make this highly prestigious list.
With this year’s leap, Nigeria has improved an aggregate of 39 places in the World Bank Doing Business index since 2016.
The Doing Business Index is an annual ranking that objectively assesses prevailing business climate conditions across 190 countries based on 10 ease of doing business indicators.
The index captures ease of doing business reforms that have been validated by the private sector and offers comparative insights based on private sector validation in the two largest commercial cities in countries with a population higher than 100 million. The report consequently features Lagos and Kano for Nigeria.
The Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment and Vice Chair of the PEBEC, Chief Niyi Adebayo, said the steady improvement in Nigeria’s ease of doing business score and rank confirmed the efficacy of the reforms implemented over the past four years.
President Muhammadu Buhari established the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council (PEBEC) in July, 2016 to deliver sustainable economic growth in Nigeria by restoring growth, investing in people and building a competitive economy.
The 2020 Doing Business report from the World Bank has reaffirmed the commitment of the newly constituted PEBEC to making Nigeria a progressively easier place to do business and removing the bureaucratic constraints to doing business in the country as we forge ahead in this Next Level.
The Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council is chaired by Vice President, with 13 ministers as members.
Welcoming the announcement, Oduwole noted that the validation confirms that Nigeria’s strategy was working and would continue to push even harder to deliver more impactful reforms.
“The private sector remains the fulcrum of the ease of doing business interventions.
“We are committed to more engagement between reform-implementing organs of government and the private sector players and we are happy to see that this has resulted in a more favourable validation of the reforms by the private sector,’’ she said.
MM/GIK/APA