Kampala — THE World Bank recently ranked Uganda in the 112th position out of 183 economies in its "Doing Business 2010" report on the overall ease of doing business Index. Despite the daunting statistics, Uganda has continued to perform better in key areas of foreign direct investment and remittance flows.

The Ugandan rankings were partly affected by the global economic meltdown. With over 50% of Uganda's budget financed by donors, the crunch saw a significant drop in budgetary finance allocations as well as reduced cash inflow to NGOs who're major partners in the Uganda's development process.

Uganda has a strong business potential owing to its natural resources such as oil and gas, an excellent weather that supports large scale agricultural production with minimal use of fertilizers and a growing mass of cheap yet skilled professionals.

The country also continues to enjoy peace and strong democratic structures, facets that have significantly attracted foreign direct investments over the years.

It is a result of this that the country has continued to attract high profile meetings such as the common wealth heads of government conference, the Smart Partnership dialogue and the recently concluded African Union summit on refugees and internally displaced persons among others.

Despite the ghastly statistics, available evidence from the Uganda Bureau of Statistics indicates that Uganda attracted $787m in foreign direct investment in 2008.

The country also registered $4.52b revenue from export of goods and services with the Southern Sudan market alone contributing $157m.

The country has equally made significant strides towards building sustainable financial systems to improve access to finance for the private sector growth.

The government instituted financial liberalisation reforms that have seen a proliferation in financial institutions from nine banks in 1992 to over 21 commercial banks, four Credit Institutions and three micro deposit taking institutions today.

This has created competition and improved access. This is in addition to building rural financial systems that have seen a significant growth in the number of SACCOs and Village based savings association to expand access in rural finance.

It is also true to argue that it is on the basis of such achievements, as a vibrant economy that has registered an all time 7% economic growth, that Uganda was able to move 20 places in the 2007 rankings to its current position.

To further develop its investment sector, the country set up a one stop investment centre at the Uganda Investment Authority whose main function is to provide investments related information to prospective investors, besides establishing a 24 hour week port and border operation geared at increasing efficiency in custom tax clearance for traders.

Efforts have equally been made to improve the road network and energy prices and supply with a recent injection of sh14b to stabilise power tariffs.

Although the country has set up structures to improve the country's competitiveness a lot more still needs to be done.

It is important that government looks at the areas it scored low from the ranking index and embarks on a systematic transformation approach.

Access to finance and corruption are still listed as key bottlenecks to Uganda competitiveness. Dialoguing with banks to develop systems that create convenience to access credit to the private sector is critical. This should be followed by punitive measures to deal with corrupt government officials.

It is equally important that UIA improves turn around time and processes for business registration and associated business establishment and registration costs.

Finally, countries such as Mauritius, New Zealand, and Singapore have registered strong successes in global competitiveness. These should therefore act as our benchmarks for continuous improvement.

The writer is a microfinance specialist