Riyadh, 4 November 2010
- Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority (“SAGIA”) is pleased to announce that Saudi Arabia has improved its ranking in the World Bank “Ease of Doing Business” Index 2011. From the 183 countries surveyed for the report, Saudi Arabia has made significant progress by moving up to 11th place from the 67th place in the global ranking it occupied in 2005. This is a testimony to a number of impactful reforms conducted in the past 5 years to ease the regulatory environment, protect investment and enforce commercial contracts, making Saudi Arabia a more competitive and attractive investment destination globally.

“We are extremely pleased to improve our ranking and continue to be recognised as one of the easiest countries to do business with on a global basis. Saudi Arabia has been very successful at attracting a steadily growing flow of foreign investment since 2005, which contributed to the country’s rapid and sustainable economic growth,” said Amr bin Abdullah al-Dabbagh, the Governor of SAGIA. “Saudi Arabia is already ranked as the easiest place to do business in, in the entire MENA region and now we are keen to compete in the international arena. We are pleased that Saudi Arabia’s efforts to reform have been recognised by the World Bank and the country moved up the ranking yet again this year. According to the World Bank, about 85% of economies made it easier to do business in the past 5 years, with Saudi Arabia ranked as the 5th fastest reformer. This is a testimony to our work over the past five years on the creation of a pro-business environment, a knowledge-based society, and by developing new world-class ‘Economic Cities’.”

Saudi Arabia’s improvement in the World Bank “Ease of Doing Business” 2011 Index ranking was driven by major reforms, including the elimination of the minimum capital requirement for starting a business, streamlining processes for starting a business and creating the foundations of a competitive internal credit market. Saudi Arabia was able to sustain and improve its position as a global investment destination ahead of 172 countries this year, while some of the other neighbouring countries in the region, like the UAE, Bahrain and Qatar moved down the league table. In 2005, Saudi Arabia was ranked 67th in the Work Bank’s “Ease of Doing Business” Index, and has dramatically improved its stance ever since to 38th place in 2006, 23rd in 2007, 16th in 2008, 13th in 2009 and 11th in 2010.

SAGIA is working to introduce positive change in Saudi Arabia’s investment environment through institutional work combined with a measurement of progress based on the criteria of the International Finance Commission (IFC), the World Bank, the World Economic Forum (WEF) and the IMD. SAGIA monitors and benchmarks the Kingdom against the nearly 300 indicators used by these organizations to measure the development of the investment environment and the capacity to attract foreign investment.

The World Bank “Ease of Doing Business” 2011 Index analysed regulations affecting 11 areas of the life of a business across 183 countries, including: starting a business, dealing with construction permits, registering property, getting credit, protecting investors, paying taxes, trading across borders, enforcing contracts, closing a business, getting electricity and employing workers.

Top corporate investors in Saudi Arabia over the past 5 years were Chevron Phillips Chemical (USA), Alcatel-Lucent (France) and BUPA Investments (UK). SAGIA and General Electric Company signed an MOU to pilot innovative and sustainable technologies in Saudi Economic Cities in June 2010.