PH slips in WB logistics rankings

The Philippines slipped yet again in the World Bank’s global ranking of countries with the most efficient logistics networks, which are seen as key to global competitiveness and economic development.

The World Bank’s latest Logistics Performance Index (LPI) report ranks 160 countries on a number of dimensions of trade including customs performance, infrastructure quality, and timeliness of shipments, which have increasingly been recognized as important to development.

The biennial survey’s results showed the Philippines’ LPI score at 3.0, putting the country at 57th in the world in terms of logistics and trade performance.

Countries are given scores from one being the lowest, to five being the highest.

In 2012, the country had a score of 3.02 and was ranked 52nd. In 2010, the Philippines ranked 44th with a score of 3.14.

In the area of clearance processes, the country’s rank jumped by 20 spots to 47th. The Philippines’ rank in the ease of arranging competitively priced shipments also improved by 21 places to 35th.

But these improvements were more than offset by the country’s lackluster performance in the areas of transport infrastructure, quality of logistics service providers, tracking and tracing and meeting expected delivery times.

On top of the latest survey was Germany, which had a score of 4.12, followed by the Netherlands (4.05), Belgium (4.04) and the United Kingdom (4.01).

Singapore, which ranked first in the 2012 survey, slipped to fifth place with a score of 4.0.

Among Southeast Asian nations, the Philippines lagged behind Malaysia (25th), Thailand (35th), Vietnam (48th) and Indonesia 53rd. The Philippines was ahead of Cambodia (83rd), Laos (131st), and Burma (Myanmar) (145th).

“Improving logistics performance is at the core of the economic growth and competitiveness agenda. Policymakers globally recognize the logistics sector as one of the key pillars for development,” the World Bank report said. Paolo G. Montecillo