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Nigeria has dropped one place on the latest Ease of Doing Business ranking released by the World Bank. The Doing Business 2019 report shows that Nigeria slipped to 146th position out of 190 countries, down from 145th place on the previous ranking.

Nigeria had moved up 24 places to 145th in the last ranking, a position that it has lost to Mali in this year’s edition.

According to the World Bank, 128 governments across the world have implemented 314 business reforms over the past year. Out of that number, 107 reforms were carried out in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The increase in global business reforms surpasses the previous all-time high of 290 reforms reported two years ago.

“This year’s results clearly demonstrate government commitment in many economies, large and small, to nurture entrepreneurship and private enterprise,” said Rita Ramalho, Senior Manager of World Bank’s Global Indicators Group. “If the reform agendas are complemented with training programmes for public officials, the impact of reforms will be further enhanced.”

The President of the World Bank, Jim Yong Kim, said, “Governments have enormous task of fostering an environment where entrepreneurs and small and medium enterprises thrive.”

He added that sound and efficient business regulations are critical for entrepreneurship and a thriving private sector. Without them, Kim said there is no chance of ending poverty and boosting shared prosperity around the world.

According to a statement released by the World Bank, Nigeria carried out four reforms, which include making the process of starting a business easier in Kano and Lagos, the two cities covered by the Doing Business report. The other reforms are Getting Electricity and Trading Across Borders.

Lagos was reported to have made Enforcing Contracts easier by issuing new rules of civil procedure for small claims courts, while Kano, in a negative move, made property registration opaque by stopping the publishing online of the fee schedule and list of documents necessary to transfer a property.

The African countries among the top 100 on the Ease of Doing Business ranking include Mauritius (20th), Rwanda (29th), Morocco (60th), Kenya (61st), Tunisia (80th), South Africa (82nd), Botswana (86th), Zambia (87th), Seychelles (96th), and Djibouti (99th).