SHARE
COPY LINK

BUSINESS

Sweden tops new transparency ranking

Sweden, along with Denmark and New Zealand, achieved the highest score in a new survey ranking 180 countries on perceived levels of public-sector corruption.

The Corruption Perception Index (CPI) is issued annually by Berlin-based Transparency International and ranks countries on a scale of zero to ten according to their perceived levels of corruption, with a higher score indicating less perceived corruption.

While Sweden’s overall score of 9.3 matched the mark it achieved in the 2007 edition of the survey, a fall by neighboring Finland opened up a spot at the top of this year’s ranking, along with Denmark and New Zealand.

The top-ranking trio from the 2008 survey is followed immediately in the index by Singapore at 9.2, with Finland and Switzerland coming next with scores of 9.0.

Iceland achieved a score of 8.9, while Norway ranked lowest of all the Scandinavian countries with a score of 7.9.

The CPI is a composite index, which aggregates results published in different expert and business surveys about countries’ perceived level of corruption.

The lowest ranked country in this year’s index is Somalia at 1.0.

Ranking slightly better, are Iraq and Myanmar at 1.3, followed by Haiti at 1.4.

BUSINESS

France’s EDF hails €10billion profit, despite huge UK nuclear charge

French energy giant EDF has unveiled net profit of €10billion and cut its massive debt by increasing nuclear production after problems forced some plants offline.

France's EDF hails €10billion profit, despite huge UK nuclear charge

EDF hailed an “exceptional” year after its loss of €17.9billion in 2022.

Sales slipped 2.6 percent to €139.7billion , but the group managed to slice debt by €10billion euros to €54.4billion.

EDF said however that it had booked a €12.9 billion depreciation linked to difficulties at its Hinkley Point nuclear plant in Britain.

The charge includes €11.2 billion for Hinkley Point assets and €1.7billion at its British subsidiary, EDF Energy, the group explained.

EDF announced last month a fresh delay and additional costs for the giant project hit by repeated cost overruns.

“The year was marked by many events, in particular by the recovery of production and the company’s mobilisation around production recovery,” CEO Luc Remont told reporters.

EDF put its strong showing down to a strong operational performance, notably a significant increase in nuclear generation in France at a time of historically high prices.

That followed a drop in nuclear output in France in 2022. The group had to deal with stress corrosion problems at some reactors while also facing government orders to limit price rises.

The French reactors last year produced around 320.4 TWh, in the upper range of expectations.

Nuclear production had slid back in 2022 to 279 TWh, its lowest level in three decades, because of the corrosion problems and maintenance changes after
the Covid-19 pandemic.

Hinkley Point C is one of a small number of European Pressurised Reactors (EPRs) worldwide, an EDF-led design that has been plagued by cost overruns
running into billions of euros and years of construction delays.

SHOW COMMENTS