Malta has remained anchored at 52 in the global competitiveness rankings issued by the World Economic Forum.

The Global Competitiveness Report 2009-2010, just published, profiles 133 economies across the globe.

Switzerland tops the overall ranking while the United States falls one place to second, with weakening in its financial markets and macroeconomic stability. Singapore, Sweden and Denmark round out the top five. Finland, Germany and the Netherlands following suit. The United Kingdom, while remaining very competitive, has continued its fall from last year, moving down one more place this year to 13th, mainly attributable to continuing weakening of its financial markets.

The rankings are calculated from publicly available data and an Executive Opinion Survey.

The latest rankings show that the EU countries behind Malta are Lithuania, at 53, having slipped from 44 last year, Hungary on 58 (62 last year), Romania on 64 (68) Greece on 71 (67) and Bulgaria 76 (unchanged). Italy is just four places above Malta.

The most problematic factors for doing business in Malta are seen as being inefficient government bureacracy, tax rates, access to financing, an inadequately educated workforce, an inadequate infrastructure and restrictive labour regulations.

The detailed list of advantages and disadvantages features, among the disadvantages, the burden of government regulation, the quality of the roads, the quality of electricity supply, the national savings rate, government debt, research and training services, the degree of customer orientation, flexibility of wage determination, hiring and firing practices, pay and productivity, female participation in the labour force and the small size of the domestic market.

The advantages far outweigh the negatives and include property and shareholder rights, intellectual property protection, the independent judiciary, the low crime rate, the quality of the port and airport infrastructure, health services and lack of trade barriers.