UAE retains trade facilitation leadership in World Bank report; climbs seven global positions in Doing Business index

HE Jamal Majid Bin Thaniah, Chairman, Dubai Trade, the premier cross-border trade facilitator, said, "We are delighted that the UAE is recognised as a great place to do business, despite the challenges facing world economies. Dubai Trade actively supports the UAE's involvement in international trade by offering the world's easiest and fastest procedures and services for trade across borders. We will continue our efforts to keep the UAE at the forefront of trade in the region and the world."

Currently in its 10th edition, the Doing Business Report investigates the regulations and reforms that positively or negatively affect business activities in a country, using quantitative indicators based on more than 57,000 unique data points collected annually to rank 185 countries and guide policymakers on required reforms in 11 vital areas for business operations such as time and cost for starting a business, paying taxes, getting electricity, protecting investors, trading across borders and getting credit. Since the creation of the report about 2,000 reforms have been implemented by various economies, with about two thirds focusing on simplifying the complexity or reducing the cost of regulatory processes.

HE Bin Thaniah said: "The World Bank's report is a valuable reference for improving services at Dubai Trade and Dubai government, as we seek to be the best in all regulatory areas that foster business environment. The report helps us identify areas for improvement and benchmark our performance indicators against the top country in each business area to set our goals accordingly. The UAE was among the first countries to use input from the Doing Business Report in its regulatory reform programme on both emirate and ministerial level. As a facilitator of trade across borders Dubai Trade has created an alliance with the World Bank, on the one hand, and the established committee of the Dubai Executive Council, the Emirates Competitiveness Council and other concerned government entities to use complete transparency in collecting data from the various trading communities, communicate them directly to the World Bank and validate the report."

Successive regulatory reforms have pushed UAE's overall global ranking in the Doing Business index from 37th two years ago to 33rd last year, up to 26th this year.

Commenting on the UAE standing in the Doing Business Report, Mr. Mohammed Al Muallem, Senior Vice President & Managing Director, DP World, UAE Region, said, "The UAE's rise to one of the world's top five economies in facilitating trade across borders is the result of a long history of process and service automation which was spearheaded by Dubai Trade in close cooperation with DP World and other strategic partners, and in consultation with the trading community at Jebel Ali Port. Innovative electronic services, such as e-payment, e- token and e-gate pass have been instrumental in contributing to this achievement. The emphasis on innovative technology to enhance trade will continue with the expanded capacity at Terminal 2 and the brand new Terminal 3 facility now under construction."

Mr. Juma Al Ghaith, Executive Director of the Customs Development Division, added: "We value our partnership with Dubai Trade, through which we aim to offer reliable, fast and highly efficient electronic services to facilitate legitimate trade movement as well as strengthen Dubai's position as a trading hub through the development of modern customs systems that contribute to the realisation of Dubai's vision and leadership, such as the customs clearance system, Mirsal 2, whose expedience and simplification of procedures has markedly contributed to growth in external trade in Dubai and the UAE. This also makes Dubai an attractive destination for global investments since customers always expect to be offered user-friendly customs clearance services that are available around the clock, with the least administrative conditions and requirements - a matter that we now offer via Dubai Trade Portal, the leading institution under Dubai World to offer electronic services to companies and establishments."

In his turn, Eng. Mahmood Al Bastaki, CEO, Dubai Trade, said: "We are glad to have our efforts to facilitate trade across borders acknowledged by the World Bank. Our rating today means that our performance has surpassed even that of several high-income member economies of the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). In all confidence, we can say that our trade across borders procedures require less documentation and are faster and less costly that those prevalent in most of Europe such as Finland and Sweden. Nonetheless, we still have much work to do to close the small gap with the world's top performer in the field, Singapore."