Taiwan ranks 61st worldwide in terms of the overall regulatory ease of doing business for this year, down three notches from the previous year, an annual report released yesterday by the World Bank Group showed.
The areas in which Taiwan performed the best were: the ease of closing a business, the ease of registering property and the ease of trading across borders, ranking 11th, 26th and 30th worldwide, respectively, the “Doing Business 2009” report showed.
The report ranks 181 economies around the world based on 10 indicators of business regulations that record the time and cost to meet government requirements in starting and operating a business, trading across borders, paying taxes and closing a business.
It also identifies a total of 239 regulatory reforms between June last year and June this year that made it easier to do business in 113 economies.
The report said that the main area of reform carried out by Taiwan during the period was in getting credit, noting that Taiwan amended its civil code to make secured lending more flexible.
Since September last year, parties to a mortgage or pledge agreement have been allowed to set the loan amount as a maximum line of credit in Taiwan, the report said, ranking Taiwan 68th in terms of the ease of getting credit.
In other areas of the report, Taiwan ranked 70th in terms of protecting investors, 88th in the ease of enforcing contracts, 100th in the ease of paying taxes, 119th in the ease of starting a business, 127th in the ease of dealing with construction permits and 159th in the ease of employing workers.
Worldwide, Singapore leads the global rankings for the third consecutive year.
Rounding out the top 10 are New Zealand, the US, Hong Kong, Denmark, the UK, Ireland, Canada, Australia and Norway.
Among economies in the East Asian and Pacific region, Thailand’s ranking was up from 19th last year to 13th this year, Malaysia’s improved from 25th to 20th, China’s was up from 90th to 83rd, and Cambodia’s was up from 150th to 135th.
Among Asia’s four tigers, Singapore, Hong Kong and South Korea all rank within the top 25, well ahead of Taiwan. South Korea’s ranking was down slightly from 22nd last year to 23rd this year.
The report said the number of regulatory reforms identified this year — totaling 239 — is a record high.
In particular, more than 90 percent of countries in Eastern Europe and Central Asia made reforms, making the two regions the top performers for the fifth year in a row, the report said.
East Asia and the Pacific had the greatest momentum in reforming business regulations this year, with 24 economies making a total of 26 reforms, the report said.
Meanwhile, a record number of reforms were seen in Africa, where 28 countries completed 58 reforms, the report said, adding that three of the world’s top 10 reformers are from the region.
The top 10 reformers are Azerbaijan, Albania, Kyrgyzstan, Belarus, Senegal, Burkina Faso, Botswana, Colombia, the Dominican Republic and Egypt.
WEAKER ACTIVITY: The sharpest deterioration was seen in the electronics and optical components sector, with the production index falling 13.2 points to 44.5 Taiwan’s manufacturing sector last month contracted for a second consecutive month, with the purchasing managers’ index (PMI) slipping to 48, reflecting ongoing caution over trade uncertainties, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The decline reflects growing caution among companies amid uncertainty surrounding US tariffs, semiconductor duties and automotive import levies, and it is also likely linked to fading front-loading activity, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said. “Some clients have started shifting orders to Southeast Asian countries where tariff regimes are already clear,” Lien told a news conference. Firms across the supply chain are also lowering stock levels to mitigate
IN THE AIR: While most companies said they were committed to North American operations, some added that production and costs would depend on the outcome of a US trade probe Leading local contract electronics makers Wistron Corp (緯創), Quanta Computer Inc (廣達), Inventec Corp (英業達) and Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶) are to maintain their North American expansion plans, despite Washington’s 20 percent tariff on Taiwanese goods. Wistron said it has long maintained a presence in the US, while distributing production across Taiwan, North America, Southeast Asia and Europe. The company is in talks with customers to align capacity with their site preferences, a company official told the Taipei Times by telephone on Friday. The company is still in talks with clients over who would bear the tariff costs, with the outcome pending further
Six Taiwanese companies, including contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), made the 2025 Fortune Global 500 list of the world’s largest firms by revenue. In a report published by New York-based Fortune magazine on Tuesday, Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), ranked highest among Taiwanese firms, placing 28th with revenue of US$213.69 billion. Up 60 spots from last year, TSMC rose to No. 126 with US$90.16 billion in revenue, followed by Quanta Computer Inc (廣達) at 348th, Pegatron Corp (和碩) at 461st, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) at 494th and Wistron Corp (緯創) at
NEGOTIATIONS: Semiconductors play an outsized role in Taiwan’s industrial and economic development and are a major driver of the Taiwan-US trade imbalance With US President Donald Trump threatening to impose tariffs on semiconductors, Taiwan is expected to face a significant challenge, as information and communications technology (ICT) products account for more than 70 percent of its exports to the US, Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said on Friday. Compared with other countries, semiconductors play a disproportionately large role in Taiwan’s industrial and economic development, Lien said. As the sixth-largest contributor to the US trade deficit, Taiwan recorded a US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US last year — up from US$47.8 billion in 2023 — driven by strong
RSS