China has received its highest ever ranking for competitiveness from the International Institute of Management Development (IMD), rising by 12 places to 19th in the world.

The Lausanne, Switzerland-based IMD's World Competitiveness Yearbook was released yesterday.

China was the biggest winner in the report, which has compared 61 national and regional economies on 312 criteria in four areas since 1989.

The country demonstrated its sharp economic growth by continuing its surge up the league table as it ranked third in economic performance, 17 in government efficiency, 30 in business efficiency and 37 in infrastructure construction.

China's forex reserves amounted to US$853.7 billion at the end of February, topping Japan to take the number one spot for the first time.

However, China is one of 29 economies in the survey of 61 nations or regions where the government is rated as having a negative impact on competitiveness.

The United States is still the world's most competitive economy but others are closing the gap, aided by better government performance and efficiency, according to the IMD report.

Hong Kong and Singapore come second and third respectively in the list and India also takes a significant leap from 39 to 29. Economies losing ground are Taiwan (18 from 11) and South Korea (38 from 29).

Experts warned China should not become complacent, and should continue to work for greater progress.

Lin Yuqin, a researcher with Chinese Academy of Social Sciences described China's leap in the rankings as "quite remarkable."

However, because of the application of different statistics, the report did not comprehensively reflect national competitiveness, he said, adding that the macro-index in several economic spheres would never tell the whole story.

He said it is difficult to make significant improvements on things such as government efficiency and scientific innovation in just one year.

"We should consider such rankings in an objective and calm way."

An alternative 2005-06 league table, by the Geneva-based World Economic Forum, showed that Finland has kept its position as the world's most competitive economy for three consecutive years, followed by the United States. China ranks 49, ahead of Brazil, India and Russia.

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