FG targets upward movement in World Bank Doing Business index

The federal government is targeting moving up further in the World Bank Doing Business index in 2018.

But the government is looking beyond moving up the ladder and is targeting making more meaningful impact on the business environment.

“It is so important that we move up as quickly as possible on the Ease of Doing Business scale, but more importantly, that we make a real impact on our business environment because this is not just about moving up or some World Bank rating. For us, it is more important that we create an environment where small and big businesses are able to do business effectively in this environment and do so with ease,” Yemi Osinbajo, vice president, said at the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council (PEBEC) Impact Awards ceremony held in Abuja on Monday.

Nigeria moved up 24 places in the World Bank Ease of Doing Business index, ranking 145th in 2018 as against 169 in the previous year status.

The country is staging reforms on ports, taxes, and business registration, among others, to attract new investors and retain existing ones.

According to Osinbajo, the federal government decided that it was time to sort out the business environment and achieved it, meeting all deadlines.

He said the cooperation by the legislative arm was commendable as the arm of government was able to meet all the deadlines set by the executive .

“For us, it is more important that we are able to create an environment where small businesses and bid businesses and everyone is able to do business effectively in this environment and to do so with ease. And I think that that is the target we have set for ourselves; that the time must come, a day must come that anyone who comes into this country will say I was able to do business easily and effectively and local businesses can confirm that it’s just a breeze to do business in Nigeria and I think that we can really achieve that. A lot of it has to do with our bureaucracy and the way that the bureaucracy works,” the vice president said.

Osinbajo said his team’s experience while working Lagos and Kano at the sub-national level showed there was so much that could be done with collaboration.

He stated that the government was working hard on that on the attitude of bureaucrats and persons charged with responsibilities of making things easy.

“Sometimes, such people may really not understand their roles as well as they ought to because the whole business of processing or giving investment approvals and all of that should be able to make things easy and not be able to become an obstacle of sorts.

And I think that that attitude is changing and we are going to ensure that it continues to make progress as we go along,” he added.

 

ODINAKA ANUDU