Ghana’s performance against corruption has improved in 2012 as against previous years, according to Transparency International’s 2012 anti-corruption report, released early on Wednesday, December 5, 2012.

Transparency International is the global coalition against corruption, and its global Corruption Perception Index (CPI) rankings of countries and territories based on how corrupt a country’s public sector is perceived to be, is the most widely used indicator of corruption world-wide.

This year’s rankings is based on a new methodology and 176 countries and territories were ranked on a scale of zero(0)- highly corrupt, to a hundred(100)-very clean. In previous years, the scale was from Zero(0) to ten(10).

Due to changes in the 2012 methodology, Transparency International stated in its press release of Wednesday December 5, 2012, that “Given the changes to the methodology, it must be emphasized that country scores of the CPI 2012 cannot be compared against those of 2011 or previous years. Year to year comparisons will be possible from 2012 onwards”

In the 2012 rankings, Ghana posted a score of 45 out of 100 to rank 64th in the world, ahead of countries such as Italy, South Africa, India, and Brazil which scored 42, 43, 36, and 43 respectively. With its score of 45, Ghana also ranks above the average score of 43 reported by the 2012 T I document.

Denmark, Finland, and New Zealand were jointly ranked first with a score of 90, while Afghanistan, North Korea, and Somalia were the least ranked at the bottom with a score of 8 each. Ghana’s 2012 performance is a significant improvement over its 2011 ranking of 69 on the old methodology. Within the last 10 years, Ghana received its best ranking of 62nd position in the year 2010, a year in which Ghana also got the highest score of 4.1 in the period.

Transparency International’s global Corruption Perception Index(CPI) is a very important indicator for international business transactions used by investors as a measure of corruption and influences global investment decisions, particularly in developing nations such as Ghana. A favourable rating such this inures to a country’s global good image, and Ghana must benefit accordingly.