More than 6 billion people live in countries with a serious corruption problem, showed the new Transparency International’s ranking. Norway, as well as her Scandinavian neighbours, is still one of the least corrupt countries in the world. However, reminds TI, there exist no country which is totally corruption-free.
In 2015 we again see Norway on the fifth place in Transparency International’s ranking of the least corrupt countries together with The Netherlands. The Danes are still on the very top, followed by Finland, Sweden and New Zealand.
Despite obvious success of the Nordic countries in the deal of beating cirruption, Transparency International warns:
– We’ve seen big corruption cases in all four Scandinavian countries in 2015.
VG writes on Monday, that Norwegian companies, for example, earn billions in Angola – one of the world’s most corrupt states.
6 Billion People Live in Corrupt Countries.
The annual survey conducted by Transparency International ranks the world’s countries according to how corrupt the public sector is assessed on a scale of 1 to 100. Countries which scored below 50 on the scale are considered to have serious corruption problems.
The average scores among the 168 observed countries in 2015 is around 43 points. That means that over 6 billion people live in countries marked by severe corruption, the report states.
On the bottom of the list are its usual guests: Somalia, North Korea, Afghanistan, Sudan, South Sudan and Angola. Where Denmark scores 91 of 100 points, Somalia and North Korea end up with 8.
TI is particularly concerned about countries where a positive trend has been reversed. In Europe TI especially mentions Hungary, Macedonia, Spain and Turkey. There was hope for positive change, but now the corruption there is growing, while the space for civil society and democracy is steadily shrinking.
One of the positive developments, mentioned in TI’s report, is crisis-hit Greece, which climbs up eleven seats to reach the 58th place. The country has, however, still significant challenges with only 46 points obtained.
Results for world superpowers are, however, mixed.
While the United States is up on a shared 16th place with Austria, Russia is on the 119th place with Azerbaijan, Guyana and Sierra Leone with only 29 points.
China is on the 83th position among 168 countries with 37 points.
Transparency Internationsl concludes: 68% of countries worldwide have a serious corruption problem. Half of the G20 are among them.
Transparency International also wants to pay attention to the fact that corruption is not just about missing money. It leads to cases of child labour, human trafficking, child mortality, poor education standards, environmental destruction and terrorism.Â
