Grant Thornton: Canada sits mid-pack in global ranking of best countries for growing businesses

TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Canada placed 18 out of fifty countries ranked for strength of each economy as a place for dynamic businesses to flourish, according to new research released today by Grant Thornton International Ltd.

“Although we sit mid-pack, we did stand out as offering a favourable business operating environment, scoring sixth place. However, our scores in the labour and human capital category and our poor showing in the economics and growth area brought down our overall ranking.”

The Global Dynamism Index, created in conjunction with the Economist Intelligence Unit, identifies five key elements of an economy’s dynamism: business operating environment, science and technology, labour and human capital, economics and growth and the financing environment. Within these five groups, 22 key data points were analyzed.

More than 400 senior executives from a broad range of countries and industries were then interviewed to determine which aspects of these attributes they deemed most important for business growth. This allowed for the weighting of each aspect according to its perceived relevance. Rather than provide a measure of an economy’s success during a period of high economic turbulence, this iteration provides a true illustration of the strength of each economy as a place for dynamic businesses to flourish.

OVERALL RANKINGS

1.	Singapore	72.1
2.	Finland	70.5
3.	Sweden	69.6
4.	Israel	69.3
5.	Austria	66.1
6.	Australia	65.6
7.	Switzerland	65.1
8.	South Korea	64.9
9.	Germany	64.8
10.	United States	64.1

18.	Canada	61.7

(Link to complete list of 50 countries: www.globaldynamismindex.com)

A. Business operating environment
(Foreign trade and exchange regimes and controls; policy towards private enterprise and competition; political stability; and legal and regulatory risk)

1.	Finland	94.2
2.	Ireland	93.4
3.	Sweden	92.8
4.	Netherlands	91.5
5.	Denmark	91.4
6.	Canada	91.2
7.	Australia	90.7
7.	Luxembourg	90.7
9.	New Zealand	90.4
10.	Austria	90.1

B. Science and technology
(Broadband subscriber lines per 100 inhabitants; growth in broadband subscriber lines; R&D as % of GDP; total IT spending growth)

1.	Israel	73.0
2.	Finland	65.8
3.	Sweden	64.9
4.	South Korea	61.0
5.	Switzerland	59.0
6.	Japan	58.8
7.	Denmark	56.4
8.	Taiwan	53.9
9.	Germany	53.5
10.	UAE	53.2

16.	Canada	42.6

C. Labour and human capital
(Productivity growth; unemployment; school life expectancy; % of population under 30.)

1.	Argentina	72.5
2.	Slovak Republic	72.4
3.	Uruguay	69.0
4.	China	67.4
5.	New Zealand	65.6
6.	South Korea	64.1
7.	Australia	63.9
8.	Norway	62.4
9.	Indonesia	62.1
10.	Taiwan	61.6

28.	Canada	54.8

D. Financing environment
(Quality of overall financial regulatory system; access of firms to medium-term capital; growth in value of inward M&A deals; value of inward M&A deals; private sector credit as % of GDP; inward direct investment growth; corporate tax burden.)

1.	Singapore	82.2
2.	Finland	72.3
3.	France	71.8
4.	Austria	71.4
4.	Chile	71.4
6.	Poland	70.4
7.	New Zealand	69.8
8.	United States	69.5
9.	Israel	68.3
10.	Slovenia	67.6

13.	Canada	61.9

E. Economics and growth
(Real GDP growth; private consumption per head; change in $ value of stock market index.)

1.	Argentina	95.6
2.	China	94.6
3.	Uruguay	82.3
4.	Chile	80.6
5.	India	80.0
6.	Indonesia	79.8
7.	Nigeria	79.4
8.	Turkey	78.0
9.	Singapore	75.3
10.	Colombia	73.8
10.	Russia	73.8

31.	Canada	57.9

“Canada is used to scoring well in all kinds of global rankings, but this analysis goes well beyond basic GDP data,” said John Harris, Partner and leader of Grant Thornton LLPs privately held business practice in Canada. “Although we sit mid-pack, we did stand out as offering a favourable business operating environment, scoring sixth place. However, our scores in the labour and human capital category and our poor showing in the economics and growth area brought down our overall ranking.”

“Without the right workers to drive a vision forward, an entrepreneur will not be able to achieve scalability – some of the most dynamic companies in the world go to great lengths to ensure they get the best people,” he continues. “Labour and human capital scores, derived from things like output per worker, education and employment rates, favour economies of emerging markets largely because growth in labour productivity favours markets that start from a lower base and have more room to grow. In Canada’s case, productivity growth scores really pulled us down – we ranked just 39 out of 50 – because our productivity is already so high.”

Being a mature economy, though, bumps Canada up the rankings in other areas. When looking at the financing environment, even though Canada’s corporate tax burden is heavier (putting us in 36^th place), our economy ranks first out of the fifty countries analyzed for access to medium-term capital. Moreover, Canada ranks third (behind Singapore and New Zealand) for the quality of its financial regulatory system.

The ten economies at the top of the overall rankings are varied, showing that there are many paths to dynamism. Since dynamism is, to a certain extent, a function of growth potential, mature economies may score lower in certain areas, but higher in areas related to stability. One thing binding the top ten together is that they are regarded has having established an industrialized base, indicating that a dynamic business environment cannot be built overnight.

NOTES TO EDITORS

To find out more about the GDI, go to www.gti.org/thinking or to access the results directly go to www.globaldynamismindex.com

INDICATORS

Categories and indicators were selected on the basis of expert analysis by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU). Indicators are drawn from a variety of sources, including: the EIU, the World Bank, Thomson Financial and UNESCO.

SURVEY

The survey of 406 senior executives was conducted by the Thought Leadership team at the EIU. All respondents held C-Suite, board roles or other senior decision making roles in awide variety of sectors and geographical regions. Around half were drawn from businesses with global annual revenues exceeding $500m. Survey respondents were asked to assign an importance to each of the indicators for their company.

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