Think Mauritius

It has been a rough ride for the Mauritian Rupee since the beginning of the year: losing nearly 15% against both the Euro and the British Pound. It loses only 5% against the “weak” US Dollar. Sithanen, the Finance Minister, is calling those having foreign currencies to convert them to Rupees. There is no sign that the Rupee will be able to claim back the lost value in the future. It is understandable that they do not wish to convert the foreign currencies. The Mauritian economy is at a cross-road. Major reforms being undertaken by Sithanen will either make or break the country. Sithanen should be selling more “dreams” to the people if he wants to succeed.

According to the Sugar Protocol, which is one of the components of the Lomé Convention signed in 1975 between the European Union and the ACP countries, each year the EU can import 1.3 million tons of sugar from the ACP countries at a relatively high price. While the Lomé Convention itself was set to expire in the year 2000, the Sugar Protocol contained terms and conditions that allowed price re-negotiation during this term.

The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) talks of 1992-1994, known as the Uruguay Round, established a 10-year phase-out of quotas for all categories of textiles and apparel.

(Read on …)

The World Bank has recently published an extensive report on doing business in 2006 worldwide (PDF). Mauritius ranked 23rd globally out of 155 countries for the ease of doing business and beating some OECD countries.

Top 30 countries where it is easier to do business:

1. New Zealand
2. Singapore
3. United States
4. Canada
5. Norway
6. Australia
7. Hong Kong (China)
8. Denmark
9. United Kingdom
10. Japan
11. Ireland
12. Iceland
13. Finland
14. Sweden
15. Lithuania
16. Estonia
17. Switzerland
18. Belgium
19. Germany
20. Thailand
21. Malaysia
22. Puerto Rico
23. Mauritius
24. Netherlands
25. Chile
26. Latvia
27. South Korea
28. South Africa
29. Israel
30. Spain

Here are some excerpts:

If you were opening a new business in Lao PDR,the start-up procedures would take 198 days. If you were opening one in Syria, you would have to put up$61,000 in minimum capital—51 times average annual income. If you were building a warehouse in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the fees for utility hook-up and compliance with building regulations would amount to 87 times average income. And if you ran a business in Guatemala, it would take you 1,459 days to resolve a simple dispute in the courts. If you were paying all business taxes in Sierra Leone, they would take 164% of your company’s gross profit.

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It is not only rich countries that achieve the right balance between safety and costs. Mauritius is among the easiest countries in which to build a warhouse. And it has the same low rate of construction accidents as Hong Kong (China). Construction licenses are just one type of business license. Here they are used as the starting point for the discussion of licensing because construction is among the largest sectors in every economy.

The report contains very-hard-to-get data on countries worldwide. However, the report does not say that, in Mauritius, one does not need a license whatsoever to become a “marchand ambulant” (hawker), start selling on the streets and does not declare any revenue to the tax authorities. C’est la vie!