Nepal's economic freedom declines further

KATHMANDU, SPET 18--The country’s economic freedom has slid further being world’s one of the least economically free countries.  The Economic Freedom of the World 2013 shows that Nepal has been ranked in 125 among 152 nations.

The annual report is produced by the Fraser Institute, Canada’s leading public policy think-tank, in cooperation with independent institutes in 80 nations and territories, which includes. It was released amid a function in the Capital on Wednesday by Samriddhi, The Prosperity Foundation, which is the partner institute from Nepal for Fraser Institute.

Nepal ranks 125 among152 countries this year with the overall score of 6.19, according to a press release issued by Samriddhi. Compared to the overall score of 6.33 in 2012 and ranking as 110th among 144 countries, Nepal has slid further down on the economic freedom ladder this year. 

This year’s report shows that the overall levels of economic freedom have increased modestly around the globe. However, for Nepal it is not the case. Compared to the previous year, growing government and decrease in freedom to trade internationally contributes to Nepal’s declining performance this year, as per the report.

Nepal has showed mixed performance in regards to all the five measured areas of economic freedom that include--size of government; access to sound money; freedom to trade internationally; and regulation of credit, labour, and business and legal structure and security of property rights. Though its ranking and scores in some of the areas have improved, Nepal’s overall performance in terms of economic freedom continues to be low.

The report has stated that the size of the government score decreased from 8.34 in previous year to 7.6 this year, legal structures and security of property rights’ score increased from 3.85 to 4.2, score on access to sound money increase slightly increased from, 6.26 to 6.3, freedom to trade internationally score decline to 6.4 from previous year’s 6.74 and regulation of credit, labour and business score inched up from 6.47 to 6.5 this year.

This year’s report shows Hong Kong continuing as the freest economy in the world with score of 8.97 out of 10. The other countries among the top ten are Singapore, New Zealand, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, Mauritius, Finland,Bahrain, Canada and Australia. The Economic Freedom of the World Report uses 42 variables to construct a summary index and measure the degree of economic freedom of countries around the world. 

This year’s publication ranks152 – an increase from 144 in 2012 –nations, using data from 2011.Economic freedom is measured in five different areas: size of government, legal structure and security of property rights, access to sound money, freedom to trade internationally, and regulation of credit, labor, and business. Venezuela is the least free economy among the 152 economies examined this year. Algeria, Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi, Central African Republic, Angola, Chad, Zimbabwe, Republic of Congo and Myanmar are the other countries in list of 10 least free economies around the world.