India loses about a quarter of its electrical power output due to problems in its transmission and distribution infrastructure. It is one of the worst loss rates in the world, although it pales in comparison to Botswana, where almost 80% of power output is lost.
India is not the only country where businesses suffer significant losses due to power failures. Nepalese firms report that they lose an astonishing 27% of annual sales due to electrical outages. Check our Value lost due to electrical outages indicator for more details.
Fascinating look into the work of Lieutenant Colonel Jenns Robertson, who compiled a database of every single bomb the US has ever dropped.
Transparency International conducts an annual cross-country survey where they collect the general public’s view on, and experiences of, corruption. How did your country fare in the latest survey? Do you agree with the results?
For someone living in a country where corruption is widespread, it is very easy to cite examples of corruption, bribery, graft, traffic of influences, nepotism, etc. Measuring corruption in a systematic way is, in contrast, a much more difficult task. Going through the database of World Bank indicators we found two indicators directly related to corruption:
Click on the links above to find out where your country ranks in terms of corruption. Note though that the World Bank does not have data for all countries.
For a far more comprehensive effort at measuring corruption, you may want to check the web site of Transparency International and its annual reports on corruption.
