World Bank Review Includes Caribbean Logistics The World Bank recently issued another controversial list. This one grades countries on their trade logistics. The report, Connecting to Compete: Trade Logistics in the Global Economy, was based on a global survey of international freight forwarders and express carriers. The purpose of the study was to bolster the World Bank’s assertion that “facilitating the capacity to connect firms, suppliers and consumers, is crucial in a world where predictability and reliability are becoming even more important than costs.” According to Danny Leipziger, the World Bank’s vice president for poverty reduction and economic management, being able to connect to global markets is fast becoming a key aspect of a country’s capacity to compete, expand, attract investment, create jobs and reduce poverty. “But for those unable to connect, the costs of exclusion are large and growing,” he said. According to the study, Jamaica’s capacity to connect to international markets to ship goods was ranked 118 of the 150 countries in the survey. For some reason, the World Bank does not survey the Bahamas. The survey said the low rank of that item reflects a lack of ease and affordability of arranging international shipments. The report included a Logistics Performance Index with seven categories. A score of one in each category was bad and a score of five was very good. No country in the world scored a five in any category and few below the top 14 registered a four. The highest score for “logistics competence” on the 150-nation list went to the second-place Netherlands at 4.25. The U.S. was No. 14, behind Singapore, the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, Austria, Japan, Switzerland, Hong Kong, the United Kingdom, Canada, Ireland, Belgium and Denmark. Jamaica’s LPI rank, of 118, was better than some of its Caribbean community competition. Haiti was ranked 123, and Guyana, 141. The Dominican Republic was the highest-ranked Caribbean nation at No. 96. The seven categories for rating included the efficiency of the customs-clearance process, the quality of transport and information technology infrastructure, timeliness of shipments in reaching destination and ability to track and trace international shipments. Jamaica’s worst category was the ease and affordability of arranging international shipments. It came in 128th place of the 150 countries. Jamaica placed 80th of the countries surveyed on the issue of customs. The time taken between the submission of an accepted customs declaration and customs clearance was measured at three days, compared to 1.7 days for Panama and 4.6 days for the Dominican Republic, both transshipment rivals of Jamaica. Singapore had only two scores below four — customs alacrity and logistics costs. The lowest scores typically were logged by poor nations that are landlocked in Africa and Central Asia.
|