Focus on exporters to further improve ease of doing business, says Hylton
PEOPLE’S National Party (PNP) spokesman on industry, competitiveness and global logistics Anthony Hylton has welcomed the reversal in Jamaica’s ranking in the latest World Bank’s Ease of Doing Business report.
But Hylton has noted that the World Bank’s ranking points to several areas of concern.
“Although the reversal in the rankings ends three consecutive years of fall in Jamaica’s ranking in the global index, it also confirmed the continuing challenges being experienced by businesses in other areas, such as trading across the border, where Jamaica continues to sit near the bottom of the rankings,” said Hylton.
He noted that while Jamaica improved its overall ranking to number 71, by four places since the last report, it falls very short of Jamaica’s highest ranking of 58 that was achieved in 2015.
Hylton pointed out that Jamaica continues to lag at number 136 in the trading across border score.
This measures the degree of difficulty experienced by businesses in navigating the bureaucracy in their attempt to export from Jamaica into other markets, or to import goods into Jamaica.
According to Hylton, the World Bank’s numbers support the recent findings in the Competitiveness Report that Jamaica is slipping in economic growth due, in part, to the small size of its market and the resulting need to increase export growth.
Hylton called on the Government to pay urgent attention to the reform of the bureaucracy affecting the export trade in areas such as the facilities supporting agricultural trade at the country’s airports and seaports, as well the Bureau of Standards and Customs.
“The rankings should give cause for reflection and a redoubling of efforts to improve the functioning of the bureaucracy in the areas affecting export trade in particular.
“We urge focused attention on those procedures in government that unduly burden exporters in time and the cost of compliance,” said Hylton.
He also called on the Government to urgently begin the Parliamentary review of the Customs Bill currently before a joint select committee of the Parliament.