According to the Global Competiveness Report 2012-2013 recently released by World Economic Forum (WEF), Switzerland was ranked as the world’s most competitive economy in the annual rankings, followed by Singapore, Finland and Sweden. Denmark was ranked 12th while Norway was 15th. In ASEAN, the top five included Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, Thailand and Indonesia respectively.
The report has taken into accounts 12 pillars including Institution, Infrastructure, Macroeconomic environment, Health and primary education, Higher education and training, Goods market efficiency, Labour market efficiency, Financial market development, Technological readiness, Market size, Business sophistication and Innovation.
Thailand’s ranking has risen one place to 38th this year, breaking a six-year streak of declines, according to the World Economic Forum (WEF).
The WEF noted that despite the improvement in Thailand’s overall ranking, “the competitiveness challenges the country is facing remain considerable”.
“Political and policy instability, excessive red tape, pervasive corruption, security concerns, and uncertainty around property rights protection seriously undermine the quality of the institutional framework on which businesses rely heavily,” said the WEF in the Global Competitiveness Report 2012-2013.
Thailand’s ranking fell 10 places in terms of institutions to 77th, while public health at 71st and basic education standards at 89th were also considered weaknesses for the country’s competitiveness.
Technology adoption also fared poorly at 84th.
Government instability ranked as the top problem for businesses, followed by corruption and policy instability.
On the other hand, the country’s macroeconomic environment showed improvement. It also ranked relatively highly in areas such as investor protection, foreign market size and the quality of local suppliers, cluster development and the breadth of value chains.
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