World Bank report says Poland is no longer a business-barrier buster

Experts praised the country only for lowering the CIT rate and introducing a flat-rate tax for small companies. Though the final report for 2004 has not been drafted yet, Poland will be ranked lower than 45th among 130 countries. This is due to the fact that reforms initiated in 2003 with regard to liberalization of the labor code and improvement of procedures related to the bankruptcy proceedings were not carried out. A number of other reforms are not working in practice. Other countries in the region are far more effective in introducing facilitations for running a business. According to the report, the paragon is Slovakia, which continues to improve its business environment for entrepreneurs. (Rzeczpospolita, pp. A1, B1) M.M.