“Doing Business 2019: Training for Reform”, a World Bank Group flagship report, the 16th in a series of annual reports comparing business regulation in 190 economies, was released on 31 October 2018. Doing Business measures regulations affecting 11 areas of the life of a business. Ten of these areas are included in this year’s ranking on the ease of doing business: starting a business, dealing with construction permits, getting electricity, registering property, getting credit, protecting minority investors, paying taxes, trading across borders, enforcing contracts and resolving insolvency. Doing Business also measures labor market regulation, which is not included in this year’s ranking.
Although Serbia has made certain improvements in its business regulation, it lowered in rank from 43rd in 2018 to 48th in 2019. According to the report, Serbia made dealing with construction permits faster by introducing an electronic application system. Also, progress is made in following areas: starting a business, getting electricity, registering property, paying taxes and resolving insolvency.
Živković Samardžić, one of the Serbia’s leading law firms is World Bank’s local partner on the Doing Business project. Živković Samardžić lawyers who contributed to the Doing Business 2019 report were partners Uroš Đorđević, Ksenija Golubović Filipović, Jovana Tomić and Igor Živkovski, of counsel Miloš Živković, senior associate Ana Popović and associate Miloš Ilić.
The full report and accompanying datasets are available at: http://www.doingbusiness.org/content/dam/doingBusiness/media/Annual-Reports/English/DB2019-report_web-version.pdf.