Not competitive enough

Pakistan has been ranked among bottom 20 of the 144 economies around the world in The Global Competitiveness Report 2012-2013, released Wednesday by the World Economic Forum.
According to the Global Competitiveness Report (GCR) 2012-13, Pakistan lacks a long-term view of competitiveness. The level of corruption and poor governance are some of the factors slowing down Pakistan’s economic growth, therefore ranking Pakistan at 124 among 144 other countries on the index. The World Economic Forum ranks countries on more than 100 economic indicators comparing 144 countries.
“Persisting divides in competitiveness across regions and within regions, particularly in Europe, are at the origin of the turbulence we are experiencing today, and this is jeopardizing our future prosperity.” said Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman, World Economic Forum. “We urge governments to act decisively by adopting long-term measures to enhance competitiveness and return the world to a sustainable growth path.”
Pakistan’s secured ranking on 12 pillars: institutions (115), infrastructure (116), macroeconomic environment (139), Health and Primary Education (117) Higher Education and Training (124), Goods Market Efficiency (97), Labor Market Efficiency (130) Financial Market Development (73), Technological Readiness (118), Market Size (30), Business Sophistication (78) and Innovation (77).
‘Pakistan has lost its competitive advantage almost on all the pillars of the competitiveness index except for in Health, Primary Education and Labor market Efficiency’ says Amir Jahangir Chief Executive Officer Mishal Pakistan, country partner for the Center of Global Competitiveness and Performance at the World Economic Forum. Further adding, although Pakistan showed good performance on the innovation and sophistication pillars, but on the factors for basic requirements and efficiency enhancer pillars Pakistan continues to show poor performance.
The Pakistani business community has identified Corruption as the most problematic factor for doing business in the country. The report indicates that Pakistan has failed to come up with effective regulations on intellectual property protection, where the country lost its position of 93 to 108 from 2011 to 2012 respectively. Poor governance in terms of favoritism in decision-making (129) and wastefulness of government spending (96) have also shown significant decline in rankings. The Efficiency of Legal Framework in Challenging Regulations has also impacted the competitiveness of Pakistan’s economy as it has declined from 79 in 2011 to 97 in 2012.
The law and order situation has been a serious threat to the economic activities, with war on terror and other target killing issues impacting throughout the year, the Reliability of Police Service has gone to 127 in the current year as compared to 116 in the last year.
On the Macroeconomic Pillar the government’s performance has been weak with the budget balance ranking (% of GDP) deteriorating from 108 to 125 from 2011 to 2012 respectively. The general government debt has also seen poor performance as it has lost 11 points from last year, by being ranked at 107 in the current year.
Although Pakistan ranked 41 in 2011 on the Tax Collection Efficiency index, however the economy has lost its competitive advantage due to decline in 2012 by ranking to 59, limitations on the ease of access to loans and venture capital availability, where Pakistan stands at 65 and 55 respectively.
The labor market efficiency pillar shows a decline in the cooperation between labor and employer relations whereas the rank has slipped from 80 to 90. The GCR also identifies that the businesses in Pakistan are shying away from reliance on professional management as the ranking has decreased from 88 to 101.