Nepal fares poorly in economic freedom ranking

Nepal fares poorly in economic freedom ranking

Nepal has fared poorly in a World Economic Freedom ranking.

Nepal ranks at 128th position, way behind neighboring country India, in the latest global rankings of economic freedom, jointly released Tuesday by independent research organization the Fraser Institute and the CATO Institute.

The Economic Freedom of the World: 2008 Annual Report has Nepal in the 128th spot with India at 77th rank along with China falling behind at 93rd and Sri-Lanka at 103rd spot just ahead of Pakistan.

Hong Kong is again first in the rankings of 141 nations and jurisdictions, followed by Singapore, New Zealand, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and Chile, the first Latin American country to break into the top 10. The 2008 report is based on 2006 data, the most recent available.

The overall rating of Nepal is 5.35 out of 10, further pushing it down from 123rd spot last time. However, neighboring country India maintains its 77th spot similar to last time with growing index every year.

The report, at present, ranks 141 countries on a range of factors in five broad areas: 1) size of government; 2) legal structure and security of property rights; 3) access to sound money; 4) freedom to trade internationally; and 5) regulation of credit, labor and business.

As the eradication of global poverty is a major concern in the world today, this year's report includes a chapter investigating the connection between economic freedom and poverty. Using various measures of poverty, the chapter's authors, Dr. Gwartney and Seth Norton from Wheaton College, found a strong positive relationship between economic freedom and poverty reduction.

Research shows that people living in countries with high levels of economic freedom enjoy higher levels of prosperity, greater individual freedoms, and longer life spans.

According to the report, Nepal's scores in key components of economic freedom (from 1 to 10 where a higher value indicates a higher level of economic freedom) has been thus; Size of government (5.26 up from 5.23 in the previous report); legal structures and security of property rights (dropped to 3.96 from 4.67); access to sound money (dropped to 6.58 from 6.61); freedom to trade internationally (improved to 5.49 from 5.40); and regulation of credit, labour and business (dropped to 5.46 from 5.83).
Source:Nepalnews.com