Malaysia managed to improve its business competitiveness over a four-month period, as the effects of the government’s reform policies began to be felt.

lan visit mustapa mohamed 200406 looking on According to Minister of International Trade and Industry Mustapa Mohamed, this is why Malaysia’s ranking in two major surveys on business competitiveness has gone in opposite directions.

Malaysia leapt five spots to 21st in the Global Competitive Report (GCR) announced today, but in May had taken a six-spot beating in the World Competitiveness Yearbook (WCY).

“The WCY data (for the May ranking) is a bit outdated. This is more recent,” Mustapa told reporters after announcing the GCR 2011-2012 ranking at his ministry today.

He said the impact of the Economic Transformation Programme and Government Transformation Programme had only kicked in over the four-month gap between the two surveys.

Besides, he noted, both surveys have different criteria.

The WCY measured 59 countries based on 331 criteria while the GCR evaluated 142 countries based on 111 criteria.

Measure of perception    

In the WCY survey, he said, Malaysia was pulled down due to poorer performance in government and business efficiency.                           

The GCR, which lauded Malaysia’s improvement in performance “across the board”, was more a measure of perception.

azlan “70 percent of the data measured ... is soft data, which means it is about perception. This means that people have a better perception of doing business in Malaysia compared to September 2010, which confirms our view that...the government is delivering improvements,” he said.

Conversely, he said, the WCY deals with only 30 percent soft data.

Asked if this shows that the ETP and GTP are only giving an impression of improvement and not actual improvement, Mustapa skirted the question.

He said the difference was only because it had taken time for the policies to take effect.

Last year, the WCY and GCR had revealed opposing results - the former boosted Malaysia eight spots, while the latter knocked the country down two spots for the third year.