Canada competitiveness ranking up three spots

For Immediate release
October 08th, 2008

But, World Economic Forum rankings indicate major improvement opportunity in the area of business sophistication and innovation, says Institute for Competitiveness and Prosperity

In the Global Competitiveness Report 2008-2009 released today by the World Economic Forum, whose Canadian partner is the Institute for Competitiveness & Prosperity, results for Canada over 2007 were positive. Canada moved up from 13th in 2007 to 10th in 2008 on the Forum’s “Global Competitiveness Index.”

“These annual indices help Canadians determine trends in the competitiveness of our economy versus our global competitors,” said Roger Martin, Chairman of the Institute for Competitiveness & Prosperity and Dean of the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management. “This is the first significant increase in our rankings and we hope they signal an improving trend for our economy in its global competitiveness.”

The Global Competitiveness Index provides an overview of factors that are critical to sustainable growth in productivity and competitiveness. It consists of three sub-indices which measure the quality of each country’s “basic requirements”, “efficiency enhancers”, and “innovation factors”.

The first sub-index, basic requirements, measures the capacity of the economy’s public and private institutions, infrastructure, macroeconomic stability, health and quality of primary education, Canada jumped to 6th in 2008 from 8th in 2007 and 14th in 2006. Strong results in the health and primary education factors, a traditional strength for Canada in the rankings, drove the increase on this sub–index.

The second sub-index, efficiency enhancers, measures the impact of higher education and training, market efficiency, and technological readiness. Canada’s rank was unchanged at 5th. Factors of strength in this sub-index include flexible labour markets, higher education and training, and our technological readiness.

On the third sub-index, innovation factors, which measures business sophistication and innovation, Canada’s ranking slipped one spot to 17th. As Martin observed, “It’s gratifying that Canada is moving up in rankings for the basic requirements as reflected by infrastructure, health and basic education. But, we should be able to take these factors for granted. For Canada to thrive in this globalizing world, we need to improve significantly in our innovation capabilities and our business sophistication.”

Besides Canada, countries showing the most significant improvement in the Global Competitiveness Index were Singapore and The Netherlands. The United Kingdom showed the most weakness dropping from 10th place to 13th place, attributable to a weakening of its financial markets.

Top ranking countries for the Global Competitiveness Index were:

1. United States
2. Switzerland
3. Denmark
4. Sweden
5. Singapore

For more information about The Global Competitiveness Report and other activities and publications of the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Programme, please visit http://www.weforum.org/gcp

About the Institute for Competitiveness & Prosperity

The Institute for Competitiveness & Prosperity is an independent not-for-profit organization established in 2001 to serve as the research arm of Ontario’s Task Force on Competitiveness, Productivity and Economic Progress. It is also the Canadian partner of the World Economic Forum. Research conducted by the Institute is primarily intended to inform the work of the Task Force. In addition, it is designed to raise public awareness and stimulate debate on a range of issues related to competitiveness and prosperity.

For more information contact James Milway, Executive Director of the Institute for Competitiveness & Prosperity at 416.920.1921 ext. 222.