Pakistan has improved its position in the World Bank’s Ease of DoingBusiness Index for the second year in a row.

According to the latest rankingslink by the globalorganization, Pakistan has improved its position by an impressive total of28 points, surging from 136th place to 108th on the rankings. The WorldBank report calls this an “unprecedented improvement”, and it is highlyindicative of the country managing to exceed even its own expectations yetagain.

Out of the six reform areas highlighted in the 2020 edition of the report,Pakistan made the highest improvement in the “Starting a Business”indicator, which is an area largely being revolutionized by the Securitiesand Exchange Commission Pakistan (SECP).

Pakistan’s ranking in this indicator has improved from 130 to 72 and isplaced at second position in South Asian countries in terms of ease ofstarting a business.

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The improvement, according to the SECP, is primarily due to the integrationof e-services with the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) and the Employees OldAge Benefits Institution (EOBI) at the federal level and with businessregistration portals of Punjab and Sindh at the provincial level.

After this integration, SECP’s e-services offer a one-window facility forcompany registration with FBR, EOBI, provincial employees social securityinstitutions, the labour department and excise and taxation departments ofPunjab and Sindh.

As a result of this reform, the number of procedures to start a business,as recorded in the Doing Business Report 2020, have been reduced from tento five and Pakistan has managed to rank “among the top ten reformersglobally”.

Pakistan emerging as an increasingly business-friendly nation is massivelygood news for the local hustle culture and the entrepreneurship environmentthat has rapidly been garnering interest over the past few years.

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