World Bank ranks Israel 30th out of 181 countries for ease of doing business

Israel's ranking is the same as in the Doing Business 2008 report. Lags badly behind less developed countries in registering property

The World Bank's International Finance Corporation (IFC) Doing Business 2009 report was published last week.

In the report economies are ranked on their ease of doing business, from 1 - 181, with first place being the best. A high ranking on the ease of doing business index means the regulatory environment is conducive to the operation of business. This index averages the country's percentile rankings on 10 topics, made up of a variety of indicators, giving equal weight to each topic.

The rankings are covering the period April 2007 to June 2008. The annual Doing Business reports are considered to be highly influential among the investor's community. The reports examine the regulatory environment for doing business by entrepreneurs in each country.

The Doing Business 2009 report ranks Israel 30th out of 181 countries for ease of doing business. However, Israel badly lags behind less developed countries in registering property, ranked 160^th.

Israel's ranking in the current report is the same as in the Doing Business 2008 report and worse than its 26th ranking in the Doing Business 2007 report.

The highest ranked  five countries in the Doing Business 2009 report are Singapore, New Zealand, the US, Hong Kong, and Denmark.

The worst five countries are all African countries: Congo-Kinshasa (181st place), the Central African Republic, Guinea-Bissau, Republic of Congo (Congo-Brazzaville), and Burundi.

Israel's ranking for 2009 compared to 2008 is as follows: