Rwanda jumps in Doing Business Rank to 67th...

It is amazing and it is official!

In just one year, Rwanda has jumped in its World Bank's Doing Business Rankings from 143rd last year to 67th out of 183 countries around the world! There has never been such a leap in a single year in any other country in the world. The World Bank has designated Rwanda as the most reformed country in the world and it is the first time with such designation among all African countries.

World Bank analyzes all countries in the world to determine how easy and friendly each country is for doing business based on 11 criteria, such as starting a new business, tax, employees, contract, closing a business, getting credit, property registration etc. World Bank ranks all countries by each criterion and rank them all in combined rankings. It is called the World Bank 's Doing Business Rankings. To give you a perspective, Singapore is ranked the 1st, U.S. the 4th, Japan the 15th, S. Korea the 19th etc.

Among African countries, there are only four countries that are ahead of Rwanda now. They are Mauritius (17th, this is also impressive), South Africa (34th), Botswana (45th) and Namibia (66th). Yes, Rwanda is now ahead of Kenya (95th), Egypt (106th), Uganda (113th), Tanzania (131th), and Malawi (132th). Please check http://www.doingbusinesss.org/EconomyRankings/ for more details.

Many countries do not pay attention to these rankings. Rwanda does and makes conscious efforts to improving its business environment. This commitment comes from the leadership and trickles down to the ministers and director general levels. Awareness produces commitment that leads to actions. Actions produce a result, an impressive result.

Rwandans are cool about this result, though. They feel that they could do better and the attitude does not look arrogant.

A few days ago, I had an opportunity to have lunch sitting next to the Minister of Agriculture of Rwanda. An intelligent lady who holds a Ph.D. in Agriculture from a university in the U.S. Her passion for improving the country's agricultural industry and farmers was evident not just in words but in deeds. A good example.

My longing for Rwanda to become the first African tiger economy and an exemplary African country only grows greater. May God bless this country! - Jeffrey