Taiwan is ranked the second-best investment destination in Asia and the fourth-best in the world, the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) said yesterday in a statement on its Web site, citing a US-based research institute’s latest report.
With a score of 70 points in the profit opportunity recommendation (POR) category, Taiwan and the Netherlands were ranked joint fourth — behind Switzerland (79 points), Singapore (77) and Norway (73) — among the 50 countries surveyed in the report by Business Environment Risk Intelligence (BERI) last month, the ministry said.
BERI conducts its surveys on the investment climates and competitiveness of the world’s 50 major economies in April, August and December every year.
The latest report offered Taiwan a “1B” rating among the surveyed economies, classifying the nation as a favorable investment environment. BERI said Taiwan’s POR scores were likely to increase to 72 next year and would stay unchanged until 2015 in view of reduced political risks and closer relations with China.
In the previous survey conducted in December, the US institute rated Taiwan as the fifth-best investment destination in the world with the same “1B” rating.
Among Asian economies, Taiwan was second to Singapore but ahead of Japan (sixth-best in the world), China (15th), South Korea (18th), Malaysia (20th), India (26th), Thailand (32nd), the Philippines (34th), Indonesia and Vietnam (both 39th).
The BERI survey evaluates a country’s investment environment in three sub-indices: operations risk, political risk and foreign exchange risk.
In the latest report, Taiwan retained the fifth-lowest ranking in the world in the operations risk index and the second-lowest in Asia, after Singapore. BERI said it predicted Taiwan would move two notches in this sub-index next year and retain the third-lowest ranking through 2015 as the economy recovers from last year’s recession.
As for the political risk sub-index, Taiwan remained the 13th-lowest in the world and second-lowest in Asia in the latest survey.
BERI indicated that the nation’s political risk had come under control with an improved cross-strait relationship — especially as Taiwan is planning to sign a trade pact with China — and that would likely help boost Taiwan’s advancement to 12th place in this sub-index next year.
Taiwan also improved its foreign exchange risk in terms of both remittance and repatriation to the third-lowest in the world, up one notch from the previous survey, and remained the second-lowest in Asia after Japan, the ministry said, citing the BERI report.
BERI said Taiwan’s foreign exchange risk would likely continue ranking the third-best in the world through 2015.
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