WEF rates Taiwan 14th in global competitiveness

2014-09-05

Taiwan ranks 14th in the Global Competitiveness Report released Sept. 2 by Geneva-based World Economic Forum, chalking up mixed performances in the survey’s 12 components.

With a score of 5.25, down 0.04 from last year, Taiwan dropped two places to its lowest ranking in six years. Switzerland, Singapore and the U.S. took the top three places among 144 economies worldwide.

According to WEF, Taiwan’s performance has been stable over the past six years, with notable strengths including efficient goods markets, higher education, innovation capacity and world-class infrastructure.

But to sharpen global competitiveness, the report said Taiwan will need to strengthen its institutional framework by addressing such areas as public sector inefficiency and labor market rigidities.

In response, the National Development Council and Ministry of Economic Affairs said the government is committed to fast-tracking industrial transformation and upgrades, as well as implementing further regulatory easing and innovation promotion measures. Some of these include the Free Economic Pilot Zones and preparation to join trade blocs such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership and Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership.

In the three subindexes comprising the benchmark, Taiwan advanced two places to the 14th in Basic Requirements on the strength of its improving infrastructure and macroeconomic environment.

“This best-ever ranking shows that government efforts bolstering public finances and basic infrastructure such as railway and telecommunications are paying dividends,” the NDC said.

Despite improvement in local labor market efficiency, Taiwan retreated one place to16th in Efficiency Enhancers as its rankings in higher education and training, as well as goods market efficiency dropped one and four spots, respectively.

While the country performed best in Innovation and Sophistication Factors, it was down four places to 13th as a result of insufficient control of international distribution and reducing company spending on R&D.

Among the nearly 120 indicators cited by the WEF in its assessment, Taiwan made the top 10 in 17 categories. These include fixed telephone lines and patent applications, both No. 1; financing through local equity marke, intensity of local competition and state of cluster development, all at No. 3; and extent of market dominance, No. 5.

Within the Asia-Pacific region, Taiwan is fourth behind Singapore, Japan and Hong Kong, but ahead of South Korea at No. 26.

Source: Taiwan Today (http://taiwantoday.tw/ct.asp?xItem=221318&CtNode=413)