2016年-世界发展银行全球_Doing_Business_Economy_Profile_2017___St_Lucia_99页_1mb

Doing Business 2017: Summary of St. Lucia

Core Content Overview

The Doing Business 2017 report evaluates the regulatory environment for small to medium-sized businesses across 190 economies, with a focus on equal opportunity for all. It provides quantitative indicators across 11 key areas of business regulation, including starting a business, dealing with construction permits, getting electricity, registering property, getting credit, protecting minority investors, paying taxes, trading across borders, enforcing contracts, resolving insolvency, and labor market regulation. The report emphasizes comparative analysis and policy benchmarking to help governments understand how their regulations compare to global best practices.

The distance to frontier (DTF) score and the ease of doing business (EoDB) ranking are the two main tools used in the report. The DTF score measures how far an economy is from the best performance in each indicator, while the EoDB ranking compares economies based on their overall regulatory environment.

Key Findings for St. Lucia

Economy Profile

• Region: Latin America & Caribbean
• Income Category: Upper middle income
• Population: 184,999
• GNI per capita (US$): 7,390
• DB2017 Rank: 86
• DB2016 Rank: 78 (adjusted for methodology changes)
• Change in Rank: -8
• DB2017 DTF Score: 63.13
• DB2016 DTF Score: 63.47
• Change in DTF Score: -0.34

St. Lucia has made a small improvement in its DTF score but a notable decline in its EoDB ranking, indicating a slight deterioration in the business environment compared to previous years.

Business Environment Highlights

• Starting a Business

  • Rank: 66 (DB2017)
  • DTF Score: 88.80
  • Procedures (Men): 5
  • Time (Men): 11 days
  • Cost (Men): 21.4% of income per capita
  • Procedures (Women): 5
  • Time (Women): 11 days
  • Cost (Women): 21.4% of income per capita
  • Best Performer: New Zealand (Rank 1, DTF Score 99.96)

• Dealing with Construction Permits

  • Rank: 54 (DB2017)
  • DTF Score: 74.54
  • Procedures: 14
  • Time: 116 days
  • Cost: 0.6% of warehouse value
  • Best Performer: New Zealand (DTF Score 87.40)

• Getting Electricity

  • Rank: 56 (DB2017)
  • DTF Score: 79.78
  • Procedures: 6
  • Time: 26 days
  • Cost: 193.1% of income per capita
  • Best Performer: Korea, Rep. (DTF Score 99.88)

• Registering Property

  • Rank: 104 (DB2017)
  • DTF Score: 59.16
  • Procedures: 9
  • Time: 17 days
  • Cost: 7.6% of property value
  • Best Performer: New Zealand (DTF Score 94.46)

• Getting Credit

  • Rank: 157 (DB2017)
  • DTF Score: 25.00
  • Strength of Legal Rights Index: 5.0
  • Depth of Credit Information Index: 0.0
  • Credit Bureau Coverage: 0.0% of adults
  • Best Performer: New Zealand (DTF Score 100.00)

• Protecting Minority Investors

  • Rank: 87 (DB2017)
  • DTF Score: 53.33
  • Strength of Minority Investor Protection Index: 5.3
  • Best Performer: New Zealand (DTF Score 83.33)

• Paying Taxes

  • Rank: 65 (DB2017)
  • DTF Score: 78.09
  • Payments per Year: 35
  • Time (hours per year): 110
  • Total Tax Rate (% of profit): 34.7%
  • Best Performer: United Arab Emirates (DTF Score 99.44)

• Trading Across Borders

  • Rank: 81 (DB2017)
  • DTF Score: 73.87
  • Time to Export (Border Compliance): 27 hours
  • Cost to Export (Border Compliance): $718
  • Time to Export (Documentary Compliance): 19 hours
  • Cost to Export (Documentary Compliance): $63
  • Best Performer: 10 Economies (DTF Score 100.00)

• Enforcing Contracts

  • Rank: 71 (DB2017)
  • DTF Score: 59.94
  • Time (days): 635
  • Cost (% of claim): 37.3%
  • Best Performer: Korea, Rep. (DTF Score 84.15)

• Resolving Insolvency

  • Rank: 114 (DB2017)
  • DTF Score: 38.79
  • Recovery Rate (cents on the dollar): 43.0
  • Time (years): 2.0
  • Best Performer: Finland (DTF Score 93.89)

Key Methodological Changes in 2017

• Expanded Indicators: The report includes postfiling processes in the paying taxes indicator, such as tax refunds, audits, and appeals.
• Gender Component: Three indicators now include a gender dimension, reflecting the different challenges faced by women entrepreneurs.
• New Pilot Indicator: A selling to the government indicator was introduced.
• New Economy: Somalia was added to the list of economies, bringing the total to 190.

Comparative Insights

• St. Lucia’s performance is generally below the regional average in most indicators.
• It performs better than Jamaica and St. Vincent and the Grenadines in several areas.
• The best performers globally are typically OECD economies, with New Zealand and Singapore leading in several categories.

Conclusion

The Doing Business 2017 report highlights the challenges St. Lucia faces in creating a more business-friendly regulatory environment. While the DTF score shows some improvement, the EoDB ranking indicates a decline. The report underscores the importance of reforms in areas such as tax procedures, property registration, and contract enforcement. Additionally, the inclusion of gender-specific data adds a new dimension to understanding the business environment, particularly for women. Policymakers in St. Lucia can use this data to identify areas where regulatory improvements are needed and to benchmark their performance against other economies in the region and globally.