The 2024 International Institute for Management Development (IMD) World Digital Competitiveness Ranking (WDCR), produced annually by IMD’s World Competitiveness Center (WCC), sees Latvia rise two places from its 40th place last year.
Latvia scores particularly well when it comes to good pupil-teacher ratio in tertiary education (16th place) and its proportion of female researchers (6th place). Its weakest scores are for its low number of foreign highly-skilled personnel (54th place) and R&D productivity (55th place).
Interestingly, Latvia's digital competitiveness is ranked higher than its overall competitiveness (45th place).
Lithuania is the highest-ranked of the Baltic states in 22nd place – notably overhauling Estonia which fell sharply from 18th to 24th place.
Overall, Singapore topped the ranking among 67 global economies. Switzerland was second and Denmark third.
“Geopolitical rivalries, particularly between major powers such as the US and China’s technological competition, are fragmenting the digital landscape, influencing not only how other countries develop and use digital technologies but also their own ability to compete globally,” said José Caballero, Senior Economist at the WCC.
The ranking system uses 38 pieces of statistical data and 21 survey responses from senior executives to measure digital competitiveness among 67 global economies – so by no means all countries are ranked.
“Digital transformation goes hand in hand with financial development and inclusion,” said Professor Arturo Bris, Director of the WCC. “In conjunction with global regulation, national policies can feed the fair use of individual information. The European Union, the UAE, and Singapore are at an advantage in this sense compared to the US and China, where the “rule of digital law” is still not fully upheld. That said, Europe’s fragmented capital markets and financing systems are major obstacles to its digital competitiveness.”
You will find the full report here.
