Morocco has emerged as one of the top-performing economies for business conditions in the World Bank’s latest Business Ready report, ranking second in both Africa and the Arab world, the report showed.
Morocco scored 63.44 out of 100 in the second edition of the assessment, up from 62.41 previously, outperforming the global average of 60.11 as well as regional benchmarks for Africa and Arab countries.
The Business Ready index evaluates business environments across ten stages of a company’s life cycle, using around 1,200 indicators grouped under three pillars: regulatory framework, quality of public services and operational efficiency.
The latest report covers 101 economies, up from 50 in its inaugural edition. About 60 percent of the countries assessed have higher per-capita income levels than Morocco. South Korea ranked first globally with a score of 78.24.
Morocco recorded gains in regulatory quality, scoring 70.06, and in public services, at 64.55. It posted particularly strong results in utilities, international trade, business creation, business location and financial services.
Operational efficiency declined slightly to 55.7 points, compared with 59.66 in the previous report, a change the World Bank attributed partly to the expanded country coverage and updated data sources.
Despite the dip, the report said Morocco continues to outperform global averages in key areas such as business creation, infrastructure and trade facilitation, while making progress in competition policy and dispute resolution, strengthening the overall business environment.
