Latest World Bank Doing Business Report - the Full Picture on Greece?
The newly published World Bank Doing Business survey shows Greece down two places in terms of the country's ease of doing business. But with major reforms on the horizon, does this report do the country justice?
London, United Kingdom, December 4, 2015 (Newswire.com) - Published annually, the World Bank Doing Business project provides objective measures of business regulations for local firms in 189 economies worldwide. Member firms of the Russell Bedford International audit network, including Action Auditing, S.A., Athens, have again contributed data to the report’s Paying Taxes survey.
The new report, Doing Business 2016: Measuring Regulatory Quality and Efficiency, shows Greece down two places (from 58th to 60th) in terms of overall ease of doing business, and down three places (from 63rd to 66th) in terms of the country’s tax regime.
The report does not, however, take account of forthcoming regulatory reform – an area likely to have significant implications for the country’s standing over the next 12 months. Stavros Papantonis, Managing Partner, Action Auditing, Athens, points out that parliamentary approval of the Recapitalisation Bill in October (likely to result in easier refinancing for businesses and entrepreneurs), coupled with new regulation allowing companies to reschedule tax, social security, and other debts to government over a period of up to 100 instalments, should lead to a considerable improvement in the country’s business environment over the next 12 months. “The World Bank Doing Business report provides an excellent snapshot of a country’s standing against its peers – but in directly addressing the cash-flow issues front of mind for all Greek businesses currently, these two very proactive reforms are likely deliver real improvements in the medium term.”
ENDS
About Action Auditing S.A.
Action Auditing S.A. is a full-service advisory firm specialising in audit, tax, due diligence and transaction support, and the preparation financial statements to domestic or international requirements (IFRS). Its specialist tax services include cross-border tax planning, VAT and transfer pricing. The firm advises multinational and domestic clients in the software, real estate, construction, and retail sectors, including a number of organisations listed on the Athens Stock Exchange.
Contact:
Stavros Papantonis
Action Auditing S.A.
T: +30 210 7217915
E: spapantonis@russellbedford.gr
W: www.russellbedford.gr
About Russell Bedford International
Established in 1983, Russell Bedford International is a global network of independent firms of accountants, auditors, tax advisers and business consultants. Ranked amongst the world’s leading accounting and audit networks, Russell Bedford is represented by some 600 partners, 5000 staff and 290 offices in more than 100 countries in Europe, the Americas, the Middle East, Africa and Asia-Pacific. Russell Bedford International is a member of the IFAC Forum of Firms and a member of EGIAN, the European Group of International Accounting Networks and Associations.
Contact:
Kempton Bedell-Harper,
Russell Bedford International
T: +44 20 7410 0339
E: kempton.bedell-harper@russellbedford.com
W: www.russellbedford.com
About the World Bank Doing Business project
The Doing Business project provides objective measures of business regulations and their enforcement across 189 economies and selected cities at the subnational and regional level.
The Doing Business project, launched in 2002, looks at domestic small and medium-size companies and measures the regulations applying to them through their life cycle.
By gathering and analysing comprehensive quantitative data to compare business regulation environments across economies and over time, Doing Business encourages economies to compete towards more efficient regulation; offers measurable benchmarks for reform; and serves as a resource for academics, journalists, private sector researchers and others interested in the business climate of each economy.
In addition, Doing Business offers detailed subnational reports, which exhaustively cover business regulation and reform in different cities and regions within a nation. These reports provide data on the ease of doing business, rank each location, and recommend reforms to improve performance in each of the indicator areas. Selected cities can compare their business regulations with other cities in the economy or region and with the 189 economies that Doing Business has ranked.
The first Doing Business report, published in 2003, covered 5 indicator sets and 133 economies. The new report covers 11 indicator sets and 189 economies. Most indicator sets refer to a case scenario in the largest business city of each economy, except for 11 economies that have a population of more than 100 million as of 2013 (Bangladesh, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Russian Federation and the United States) where Doing Business, also collected data for the second largest business city. The data for these 11 economies are a population-weighted average for the two largest business cities. The project has benefited from feedback from governments, academics, practitioners and reviewers. The initial goal remains: to provide an objective basis for understanding and improving the regulatory environment for business around the world.