PUTRAJAYA: Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak says the government aims to cut start-up time for businesses to three days,  in line with World Bank standards.

The current start-up period for businesses in Malaysia is 11 days.

Najib said this at the launch of the Malaysian Corporate Identity Number (MyCoID) at the Putrajaya International Convention Centre this afternoon.

The Prime Minister said the initiative was another step forward in raising Malaysia's ranking in the World Bank's Ease Of Doing Business.

"This is because one of its categories is the ease of doing business, which concerns the time required to start a business. So, the gateway that we will create, which will take about six months, and the additional allocation that has been announced, means that by the end of
this year, we will be able to achieve the standard of starting a business within three days," he told reporters after launching the "MyCoID, 1 Corporate Identity" today.

MyCoID refers to the company number assigned by the Companies Commission of Malaysia (CCM) that will be used as a single serial reference number for various registrations and transactions with the relevant government agencies.

According to Najib, MyCoID will help reduce the amount of time needed for a business to begin in Malaysia by using a common reference
number.

Najib also announced an additional RM4.5 million allocation for the Domestic Trade and Consumer Ministry to complete the MyCoID project.

Currently, the MyCoID is used by the Inland Revenue Board, Employees Provident Fund, Human Resources Development Fund, Social Security Organisation and the Small and Medium Enterprise Corp Malaysia.

The use of MyCoID will eventually be expanded to other ministries and government agencies.

During the press conference Najib said that it now only takes one day for a company to register with CCM.

According to statistics from World Bank 2010 Ease Of Doing Business report, Malaysia was ranked 88th among 183 countries surveyed in terms of starting a new business.

The report said that new companies on average went through 11 days of red tape in Malaysia before they could launch their businesses.

New Zealand topped the list in this category followed by Canada, Australia, Singapore and Georgia.

However, in the overall Ease Of Doing Business rankings, Singapore topped the list followed by New Zealand, Hong Kong, the US and the UK. Malaysia is ranked 23rd in 2010, two spots lower than in 2009.

Meanwhile, Najib said that changes to the China-Asean Free Trade Area cannot be made based on a bilateral approach.

“As it is an Asean FTA, it’s a multi-lateral agreement and we cannot go on the basis of bilateral arrangement. It has to be negotiated on an
Asean basis. But, the most important thing is for us to be as competitive as possible. We need to be competitive and make the necessary adjustments to succeed,” Najib.

The prime minister was responding to a question on whether the government intends to request China to limit the increase of its exports to Malaysia to 10% over the previous year’s exports.

Associated Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry of Malaysia  President Tan Sri William Cheng made the suggestion during
the 1Malaysia Economic conference earlier this week.

On whether Peninsular Malaysia is still scheduled to receive power from the Bakun Dam project, the premier said the federal government needs to discuss this with the Sarawak government.

“There are two requirements that have to be taken into account. First, we need to know the power requirement for Peninsular Malaysia, and the other is the power requirements of the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy and the heavy industries involved.”

When asked if the government is planning to speed up the plan to remove gas subsidies for industries, Najib said, “It is going to be
gradual. And when we are ready, we will make the announcement”.