Firms competing against unregistered firms (% of firms) - Country Ranking

Definition: Firms competing against unregistered firms are the percentage of firms competing against unregistered or informal firms.

Source: World Bank, Enterprise Surveys (http://www.enterprisesurveys.org/).

See also: Thematic map, Time series comparison

Find indicator:
Rank Country Value Year
1 Uganda 95.20 2013
2 Sudan 90.50 2014
3 Tonga 86.80 2009
4 Niger 85.10 2017
5 Cameroon 80.30 2016
6 Chad 80.00 2018
7 Mali 79.50 2016
8 Bolivia 78.90 2017
9 Mauritania 78.50 2014
10 Dem. Rep. Congo 78.40 2013
11 Antigua and Barbuda 78.10 2010
12 Cambodia 77.80 2016
13 Guatemala 77.10 2017
14 Senegal 76.40 2014
15 Gabon 76.00 2009
16 Peru 75.90 2017
17 Guinea 75.70 2016
18 Côte d'Ivoire 75.60 2016
19 Burkina Faso 75.00 2009
20 Zimbabwe 73.90 2016
21 Eswatini 73.50 2016
22 Nicaragua 72.90 2016
23 Tanzania 72.60 2013
24 Honduras 72.50 2016
24 Grenada 72.50 2010
24 Argentina 72.50 2017
27 Papua New Guinea 72.30 2015
27 Paraguay 72.30 2017
29 Madagascar 71.70 2013
29 Malawi 71.70 2014
31 The Gambia 71.10 2018
32 Costa Rica 70.40 2010
33 Mexico 70.30 2010
34 Brazil 69.70 2009
34 Congo 69.70 2009
36 Ghana 69.40 2013
37 Trinidad and Tobago 69.20 2010
38 Kenya 68.80 2018
39 Togo 68.70 2016
39 Liberia 68.70 2017
41 Lesotho 68.10 2016
42 Uruguay 67.90 2017
43 El Salvador 67.70 2016
44 The Bahamas 67.50 2010
45 Ecuador 67.10 2017
46 Algeria 66.80 2007
46 Benin 66.80 2016
48 Central African Republic 66.70 2011
49 Jamaica 66.40 2010
50 Colombia 66.10 2017
51 St. Kitts and Nevis 65.40 2010
51 Zambia 65.40 2019
53 Indonesia 65.00 2015
53 St. Vincent and the Grenadines 65.00 2010
55 Samoa 63.60 2009
56 Sierra Leone 62.50 2017
57 Dominican Republic 61.10 2016
58 Tunisia 60.90 2020
59 Guyana 59.80 2010
60 Solomon Islands 59.70 2015
61 Belize 58.50 2010
62 Mozambique 58.00 2018
63 China 57.70 2012
64 Montenegro 57.50 2019
65 Timor-Leste 56.80 2015
66 Lebanon 56.30 2019
67 Chile 55.80 2010
68 Nepal 55.70 2013
69 Botswana 54.60 2010
69 Suriname 54.60 2018
71 North Macedonia 54.50 2019
72 Guinea-Bissau 53.70 2006
73 Syrian Arab Republic 52.60 2009
74 Bulgaria 52.40 2019
75 Kyrgyz Republic 51.40 2019
75 Panama 51.40 2010
77 Burundi 51.30 2014
78 Mauritius 51.00 2009
79 Ukraine 50.30 2019
80 Turkey 50.20 2019
81 India 50.10 2014
82 Serbia 49.70 2019
83 Vietnam 49.50 2015
84 Barbados 49.40 2010
85 Iraq 49.30 2011
86 Jordan 48.60 2019
87 Sri Lanka 47.40 2011
88 Lithuania 47.30 2019
89 Morocco 47.20 2019
90 Portugal 47.00 2019
91 Pakistan 46.50 2013
92 Nigeria 46.20 2014
93 Albania 44.70 2019
94 Cabo Verde 44.50 2009
95 Cyprus 44.00 2019
96 Yemen 43.00 2013
97 Bosnia and Herzegovina 42.10 2019
98 Greece 41.90 2018
99 Namibia 41.70 2014
100 Afghanistan 41.50 2014
101 Angola 41.20 2010
102 Moldova 41.00 2019
103 Lao PDR 39.90 2018
103 Vanuatu 39.90 2009
105 Malaysia 39.80 2015
106 Fiji 39.60 2009
107 Slovak Republic 39.50 2019
108 Bangladesh 39.40 2013
109 Kazakhstan 39.20 2019
110 Egypt 39.10 2020
111 Latvia 37.40 2019
112 Ireland 35.80 2020
113 Myanmar 31.50 2016
114 Philippines 30.90 2015
115 Estonia 29.90 2019
115 Azerbaijan 29.90 2019
117 Venezuela 29.80 2010
118 Rwanda 29.60 2019
119 Denmark 29.40 2020
120 Armenia 28.90 2020
121 Eritrea 28.20 2009
121 Russia 28.20 2019
123 Poland 27.40 2019
124 Malta 26.80 2019
125 Thailand 25.10 2016
126 Czech Republic 24.60 2019
127 Ethiopia 23.10 2015
128 Finland 22.50 2020
129 Georgia 22.40 2019
130 Mongolia 22.30 2019
131 Italy 22.20 2019
131 Djibouti 22.20 2013
133 Uzbekistan 21.50 2019
134 Belarus 20.30 2018
135 Belgium 19.20 2020
136 Romania 18.80 2019
137 St. Lucia 18.20 2010
137 Slovenia 18.20 2019
139 Sweden 18.10 2020
140 Netherlands 18.00 2020
141 Israel 17.40 2013
142 South Africa 17.10 2020
142 Croatia 17.10 2019
144 Luxembourg 14.00 2020
145 Hungary 13.70 2019
146 Tajikistan 11.80 2019
147 Dominica 10.70 2010
148 Bhutan 7.20 2015

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Development Relevance: Firms evaluating investment options, governments interested in improving business conditions, and economists seeking to explain economic performance have all grappled with defining and measuring the business environment. The firm-level data from Enterprise Surveys provide a useful tool for benchmarking economies across a large number of indicators measured at the firm level. Informality is associated with business operations without registration. The informal sector in an economy may be a source of unfair competition to formal firms and also deprive governments of potential tax revenue and diminish a government's capacity for regulatory oversight. Informality can be defined along different dimensions such as operating without registration, income tax evasion, labor tax evasion, or operating outside the legal framework of an economy. Firms may show different degrees of informality along these dimensions which may also overlap. A large informal sector has serious consequences for the formal private sector, and may pose unfair competition for formal firms. It is an approximation to the prevalence of informality in the private economy.

Limitations and Exceptions: The sampling methodology for Enterprise Surveys is stratified random sampling. In a simple random sample, all members of the population have the same probability of being selected and no weighting of the observations is necessary. In a stratified random sample, all population units are grouped within homogeneous groups and simple random samples are selected within each group. This method allows computing estimates for each of the strata with a specified level of precision while population estimates can also be estimated by properly weighting individual observations. The sampling weights take care of the varying probabilities of selection across different strata. Under certain conditions, estimates' precision under stratified random sampling will be higher than under simple random sampling (lower standard errors may result from the estimation procedure). The strata for Enterprise Surveys are firm size, business sector, and geographic region within a country. Firm size levels are 5-19 (small), 20-99 (medium), and 100+ employees (large-sized firms). Since in most economies, the majority of firms are small and medium-sized, Enterprise Surveys oversample large firms since larger firms tend to be engines of job creation. Sector breakdown is usually manufacturing, retail, and other services. For larger economies, specific manufacturing sub-sectors are selected as additional strata on the basis of employment, value-added, and total number of establishments figures. Geographic regions within a country are selected based on which cities/regions collectively contain the majority of economic activity. Ideally the survey sample frame is derived from the universe of eligible firms obtained from the country’s statistical office. Sometimes the master list of firms is obtained from other government agencies such as tax or business licensing authorities. In some cases, the list of firms is obtained from business associations or marketing databases. In a few cases, the sample frame is created via block enumeration, where the World Bank “manually” constructs a list of eligible firms after 1) partitioning a country’s cities of major economic activity into clusters and blocks, 2) randomly selecting a subset of blocks which will then be enumerated. In surveys conducted since 2005-06, survey documentation which explains the source of the sample frame and any special circumstances encountered during survey fieldwork are included with the collected datasets. Obtaining panel data, i.e. interviews with the same firms across multiple years, is a priority in current Enterprise Surveys. When conducting a new Enterprise Survey in a country where data was previously collected, maximal effort is expended to re-interview as many firms (from the prior survey) as possible. For these panel firms, sampling weights can be adjusted to take into account the resulting altered probabilities of inclusion in the sample frame.

Original Source Notes: All surveys were administered using the Enterprise Surveys methodology as outlined in the Methodology page which can be found from www.enterprisesurveys.org.

Statistical Concept and Methodology: Firm-level surveys have been conducted since the 1990's by different units within the World Bank. Since 2005-06, most data collection efforts have been centralized within the Enterprise Analysis Unit. Surveys implemented by the Enterprise Analysis Unit follow the Global Methodology. Private contractors conduct the Enterprise Surveys on behalf of the World Bank. Due to sensitive survey questions addressing business-government relations and bribery-related topics, private contractors, rather than any government agency or an organization/institution associated with government, are hired by the World Bank to collect the data. Confidentiality of the survey respondents and the sensitive information they provide is necessary to ensure the greatest degree of survey participation, integrity and confidence in the quality of the data. Surveys are usually carried out in cooperation with business organizations and government agencies promoting job creation and economic growth, but confidentiality is never compromised. The Enterprise Survey is answered by business owners and top managers. Sometimes the survey respondent calls company accountants and human resource managers into the interview to answer questions in the sales and labor sections of the survey. Typically 1200-1800 interviews are conducted in larger economies, 360 interviews are conducted in medium-sized economies, and for smaller economies, 150 interviews take place. The manufacturing and services sectors are the primary business sectors of interest. This corresponds to firms classified with ISIC codes 15-37, 45, 50-52, 55, 60-64, and 72 (ISIC Rev.3.1). Formal (registered) companies with 5 or more employees are targeted for interview. Services firms include construction, retail, wholesale, hotels, restaurants, transport, storage, communications, and IT. Firms with 100% government/state ownership are not eligible to participate in an Enterprise Survey. Occasionally, for a few surveyed countries, other sectors are included in the companies surveyed such as education or health-related businesses. In each country, businesses in the cities/regions of major economic activity are interviewed. In some countries, other surveys, which depart from the usual Enterprise Survey methodology, are conducted. Examples include 1) Informal Surveys- surveys of informal (unregistered) enterprises, 2) Micro Surveys- surveys fielded to registered firms with less than five employees, and 3) Financial Crisis Assessment Surveys- short surveys administered by telephone to assess the effects of the global financial crisis of 2008-09. The Enterprise Surveys Unit uses two instruments: the Manufacturing Questionnaire and the Services Questionnaire. Although many questions overlap, some are only applicable to one type of business. For example, retail firms are not asked about production and nonproduction workers. The standard Enterprise Survey topics include firm characteristics, gender participation, access to finance, annual sales, costs of inputs/labor, workforce composition, bribery, licensing, infrastructure, trade, crime, competition, capacity utilization, land and permits, taxation, informality, business-government relations, innovation and technology, and performance measures. Over 90% of the questions objectively ascertain characteristics of a country’s business environment. The remaining questions assess the survey respondents’ opinions on what are the obstacles to firm growth and performance. The mode of data collection is face-to-face interviews.

Aggregation method: Unweighted average

Periodicity: Annual