South Africa ranked eighty-fourth out of 165 countries and territories included in the ‘Economic Freedom of the World: 2021 Annual Report’ released by think tank the Free Market Foundation in conjunction with Canada’s Fraser Institute.

In 2000, South Africa ranked fifty-eighth on the list of countries analysed, the foundation highlights.

It mentions that South Africa has seven African countries ahead of it on the economic freedom list.     

Hong Kong and Singapore again topped this year’s index.

New Zealand, Switzerland, Georgia, the US, Ireland, Lithuania, Australia and Denmark rounded out the top ten.

The report, based on 2019 data (the most recent comparable data), warns that recent events in Hong Kong will likely cause its score to fall as data becomes available for 2020 and this year.

The report measures the economic freedom (levels of personal choice, ability to enter markets, security of privately owned property, rule of law, etc.) by analysing the policies and institutions of 165 countries and territories.

The ten lowest-ranked countries are the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Syria, Congo-Brazzaville, Iran, Zimbabwe, Algeria, Libya, Sudan and Venezuela.

South Africa recorded the following scores in key components of economic freedom (from one to ten where a higher value indicates a higher level of economic freedom): size of government changed to 7.00 from 5.59 in the last year’s report; legal system and property rights changed to 5.95 from 6.36; access to sound money changed to 8.25 from 8.10; freedom to trade internationally changed to 6.50 from 6.47; and regulation of credit, labour and business changed to 7.16 from 7.54.