Bangladesh has moved up eight notches to 110th in this year's Global Competitiveness Index (GCI), compared with last year's 118th.

Improvement in two key areas—macro-economic management and infrastructure—helped the country make progress in the index for 2013-14, according to the Global Competitiveness Report (GCR) to be released by the Centre for Policy Dialogue in Bangladesh today.

GCR is an annual publication of the World Economic Forum (WEF), which has already published the report worldwide.

GCR is one of the world's most comprehensive and respected assessments of country competitiveness,

offering insight into policies, institutions and factors driving productivity and then, enabling sustained economic growth and long-term prosperity.

"The Global Competitiveness Report 2013-2014 is being released at a time when the world economy is undergoing significant shifts," the WEF said in the report's preface.

"The global financial crisis and the ensuing developments have heightened the role of emerging economies in the global context."

"This has accelerated the major economic transformations already underway, which have fueled rapid growth and lifted millions of people out of poverty," it said.

Based on the report, the WEF made an index of 148 countries this

year, after evaluating 12 different issues, known as "twelve pillars".

The pillars include institutions, infrastructure, macroeconomic environment, health and primary education, higher education and training, goods market efficiency and labour market efficiency.

Financial market development, technological readiness, market size, business sophistication and innovation have also been considered to prepare the competitiveness index.

"Although we report the results of the 12 pillars of competitiveness separately, it is important to keep in mind that they are not independent: they tend to reinforce each other, and a weakness in one area often has a negative impact in others," the WEFsaid.

According to the latest GO, the most problematic factors for doing business in Bangladesh are corruption, inadequate supply of infrastructure, inefficient government bureaucracy, access of financing, government instability and inadequately educated workforce.

Policy instability, tax regulations, poor

work ethics in national labour force, inflation, tax rates, restrictive labour regulations and poor public health are also creating barriers in doing business in Bangladesh, it said.

Switzerland topped the GCI, followed by Singapore, Finland, Germany and the United States. Among the South Asian nations, India ranked 60th, while Sri Lanka 65th, Bhutan 109th and Nepal 117th.