Romania went down another three places to 55th place in the World Bank’s Doing Business 2020 ranking, which evaluates the ease of doing business in 190 countries around the world. Romania has seen a constant involution since 2016 when it ranked 36th.

The report notes, however, that Romania has made some progress compared to last year. Romania made starting a business easier by allowing voluntary value-added tax registration, which is less time consuming than mandatory registration. Paying taxes is also less costly after Romania eliminated five employer-paid taxes and contributions and introduced a new work insurance contribution paid by the employer.

The biggest problems companies face in Romania are getting electricity (a score of only 53.7 points out of 100) and dealing with construction permits (58.4 points). Resolving insolvency (59.1 points) and protecting minority investors (62 points) are also thorny issues in Romania.

Meanwhile, Romania had relatively good scores for trading across borders (100 points, mainly due to EU membership), starting a business (87.7 points), paying taxes (85.2 points) and getting credit (80 points).

Romania’s overall score this year (73.3 points) is higher than last year (72.3 points), but the country went down in the ranking because other countries recorded more significant progress. Hungary (52), Morocco (53), and Cyprus (54) are among the countries that surpassed Romania compared to last year’s ranking.

Romania also ranks lower than neighbors Serbia (44) and Moldova (48), but higher than Bulgaria (61) and Ukraine (64). The Eastern European country where its easiest to do business, according to the World Bank, is Georgia, which ranks seventh overall with a score of 83.7 points, ahead of the UK, Norway, Sweden, and Germany. Lithuania (11), North Macedonia (17), Estonia (18) and Latvia (19) are also among the region’s best performers.

New Zealand continues to be the country where it’s easiest to do business, with a score of 86.8 points, followed by Singapore (86.2 points) and Hong Kong (85.3 points), which surpassed Denmark this year.

The Doing Business 2020 report is available here and Romania's country profile can be found here.

editor@romania-insider.com

(Photo source: Pixabay.com)