Asia is home to some of the world's fastest-growing economies but lags behind other regions in adopting reforms that make it easier to start businesses and generate jobs, according to a World Bank report on Tuesday.
New Zealand was ranked as the easiest country in the world in which to do business, followed by Singapore and the United States. Australia was rated sixth, Hong Kong was seventh, and Japan was 10th.
But of the 12 countries most active in adopting reforms over the past year, Vietnam was the lone representative from East Asia. It scored marks for a new bankruptcy law, steps to streamline contract enforcement and lower costs for registering property, although it still ranked 99th overall.
While East Asian countries trail only the rich members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in imposing the fewest regulatory burdens on business, the region is reforming more slowly than Eastern Europe, OECD members, Latin America, the Caribbean and South Asia, the report found.
"Countries in Asia are actually falling behind other countries in the world in terms of reform," Tim Krause, senior regional manager for East Asia and the Pacific at the World Bank's International Finance Corp arm, told a media briefing.
"We hope that (the report) will result in specific countries taking specific actions to improve their rating," he said.
India was in 116th place, while Pakistan was rated 60th and was also among the 12 top reformers over the past year.
Of 155 economies studied, China ranked 91st while the Philippines ranked 113th, two places ahead of Indonesia.
The report focused on the business environment faced by small and mid-sized enterprises and studied factors including taxes, licensing, and the ease of hiring and firing workers.
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