Turkey performs record number of reforms: World Bank

By Muhammed Ali Gurtas

ANKARA

Turkey showed a notable progress in reforms to enhance the business climate, the World Bank announced on Wednesday.

"Turkey carried out a record number of business reforms in the past year, earning the country a spot in this year’s top 10 global improvers," the bank said in a statement.

According to the Doing Business 2019 - Training for Reforms report, last year's reforms accelerated Turkey's efforts to improve the business climate for domestic small and medium enterprises -- SMEs.

"In the past five years, Turkey has averaged just one reform a year," the bank said, adding:

"As a result of the past year’s reforms, Turkey advanced to 43rd place in the global ease of doing business ranking."

Johannes Zutt, World Bank Country Director for Turkey, said: "I am pleased to note the priority the government is placing on the important agenda of improving the business climate to boost investment and create jobs."

"Given the current economic environment in Turkey, it is, nevertheless, encouraging to the global business community and local entrepreneurs alike to see the process of conducting business simplified in so many doing business areas,” Zutt said.

As noted in the report, Turkey implemented a total of seven reforms; including for starting a business, dealing with construction permits, getting credit, paying taxes, trading across borders, enforcing contracts, and resolving insolvency.

"The country performs best in the areas of enforcing contracts, with a global rank of 19, and protecting minority investors [26th place].

"For example, resolving a commercial dispute through a local first-instance court in Turkey costs 25 percent of the claim value, compared to the regional average of 26.3 percent," the bank said.

The World Bank also noted that Turkey is one of only seven economies in the world that score 15 or higher in the quality of the judicial administration index.

"It also performs well in the area of registering property, with a global rank of 39," it said. "At just five days, it is four times faster to register a property transfer in Turkey than in the region."