Tanzania has shot 13 places up the global economic competitiveness list, thanks to improved security and an improving environment for the private sector.

The World Economic Forum's (WEF's) Global Competitiveness Report 2009/10 shows that Tanzania is now in the 100th position, up from the 113th slot it held in 2008/09.

"Tanzania has seen an impressive improvement this year of 13 ranks, up to 100th place The country benefits from public institutions that are characterised by reasonable public trust of politicians, relative government evenhandedness in its dealings with the private sector and a security situation that is good by regional standards," the report says.

The WEF bases its assessment on a range of factors that are key for any country to prosper. The index includes economic data such as growth and statics on health Internet usage.

The study also factors in a survey among business leaders, assessing, for example, the Government's efficiency or flexibility of the labour market.

Tanzania is now immediately below Kenya and Nigeria in the overall rankings.

Kenya is ranked 98th, having dropped five places, while Nigeria is also down five places and is ranked 99th.

Nigeria has dropped largely due to weak institutions, a serious security problem, high levels of corruption and lavish government spending.

Uganda has also improved significantly though it remains below Tanzania and Kenya. The country now stands in the 108th position from last year's 128th. Burundi is at the tail end of the list of 133 surveyed countries while Rwanda, which is also an East African Community (EAC) member state, was not surveyed.

But while Tanzania has performed well in some areas, the country has demonstrated weaknesses in a number of areas such as infrastructure, education and health.

"Infrastructure in the country is underdeveloped, with poor quality roads, ports, and electricity supply, and a few telephone lines quality of the educational system receives a poor assessment the basic health of the workforce is also a serious concern," the report says in part.

The country has improved its primary education enrolment, but enrolment rates at the secondary and university levels are still among the lowest in the world.

"Related to the education level of the workforce, the adoption of new technologies is low in Tanzania, with very low uptake of ICTs (Information and Communication Technologies) such as the Internet and mobile telephony."

There are also high levels of diseases such as malaria, tuberculosis and Aids.

Reacting to the report, Industries, Trade and Marketing minister Mary Nagu said the country's plans were on track, and predicted that that Tanzania would climb even higher in next year's rankings.

"We have built a lot of classrooms. I'm not surprised that the quality of our education has been questioned, but we have made big strides. We are now training teachers but it should be understood that while it takes less than one month to build a classroom, it takes more than three years to train a teacher," she noted.

In addition, some universities have been built, including the University of Dodoma which will be the country's biggest higher education institution when complete.

On infrastructure, the minister said it was true that there were problems with the country's ports and rail transports, noting, however, that the road infrastructure had improved "tremendously" in the last few years.

"I'm we will do even better in a similar report next year," Dr Nagu said.

Members of the business community cite poor infrastructure as the major impediment to doing business and investing in Tanzania.

At the recent 3rd Local Investors Roundtable (3rd LIR) held in Dar es Salaam, local investors called for a heavy investment in infrastructure and accused the Government of lacking commitment in the public private partnership (PPP) in financing for infrastructure projects.

And according to International Monetary Funds (IMF) experts, the poor state and inadequacy of Tanzania's infrastructure is largely due to meek investments made by the government into the sector.

In one of the fund's recent working papers, entitled Creating Sustainable Fiscal Space for Infrastructure: The Case of Tanzania, experts Teresa Ter-Minassian, Richard Hughes, and Alejandro Hajdenberg noted that spending for roads, railways, water supply and power systems has remained minimal for a long time.

"Within those items of expenditure classed as 'priority spending' to achieve the Mkukuta [the National Strategy for Growth and Reduction of Poverty] objectives, the shares of the two items identifiable as infrastructure i.e.

water and roads in total spending have not seen a sustained increase since 2000-01," it reads in part, a document which the IFM says does not reflect its official position.

It is only about 11 per cent of Tanzanian households that have access to electricity and only 28 per cent of the rural population living within 2km of an all-weather road.

At the global level, the new WEF report notes that Switzerland has knocked the United States off the position as the world's most competitive economy due to the crash of the US banking system that left the world's richest nation more exposed to some long-standing weaknesses.