World Bank : Iran Made Cross-Border Trade Easier

The Islamic Republic of Iran made exporting and importing easier by expanding the services offered by the national single window, said the World Bank in its Doing Business 2017 report for the Middle East and North Africa, acknowledging the fact that the country has taken strides to improve its status when it comes to "trading across borders".  

WB's Doing Business sheds light on how easy or difficult it is for a local entrepreneur to open and run a small- to medium-sized enterprise when complying with relevant regulations. It measures and tracks changes in regulations affecting 11 areas in the life cycle of a business, including  starting a business, receiving construction permits, getting electricity, registering property and  getting credit.

Among other factors, the bank adds that Iran has also made getting electricity easier by eliminating the need for customers to obtain an excavation permit for electricity connection works.

"The Islamic Republic of Iran made starting a business easier by streamlining the name reservation and company registration procedures.

[It] strengthened investor protections by requiring greater immediate disclosure of related-party transactions," the report adds.  

According to the global institution's influential report, Iran eased the launch of business startups by installing a web portal allowing entrepreneurs to search for and reserve a unique company name for 2017.

"The establishment of a new private credit bureau improved access to credit information," it said.  

The Islamic Republic of Iran made enforcing contracts easier and faster by introducing electronic filing of some documents, text message notification and an electronic case management system.

The country made starting a business easier by streamlining the name reservation and company registration procedures, WB said.  

Among less business-friendly points, the bank also noted that Iran has made starting a business more difficult by requiring company founders to obtain a criminal record clearance to register a new company.

According to the report, in economies around the world, trading across borders as measured by Doing Business has become faster and easier over the years.

Governments have introduced tools to facilitate trade by setting up single windows, risk-based inspections and electronic data interchange systems. These changes help improve their trading environment and boost firms’ international competitiveness.

The WB report also records the time and cost associated with the logistical process of exporting and importing goods.

Under the new methodology introduced this year, Doing Business measures the time and cost associated with three sets of procedures—documentary compliance, border compliance and domestic transport—within the overall process of exporting or importing a shipment of goods.

The ranking of economies on the ease of trading across borders is determined by sorting their distance to frontier scores for trading across borders. These scores are the simple average of the distance to frontier scores for the time and cost for documentary compliance and border compliance to export and import.