While corruption continues to cripple the global battle against poverty, the EU-25 countries all score fairly high in Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index 2004.
In the 2004 index, which was released on 20 October, sixty countries score below three out of ten. TI identifies three points as the benchmark for “rampant corruption”. A further 106 countries of the 146 evaluated score less than five.
The countries with the cleanest slate were found to be Finland, New Zealand, Denmark, Iceland and Singapore. At the bottom end of the ladder were Nigeria, Bangladesh and Haiti.
“Corruption in large-scale public projects is a daunting obstacle to sustainable development and results in a major loss of public funds needed for education, healthcare and poverty alleviation, both in developed and developing countries,” said TI Chairman Peter Eigen.
The CPI is a composite index that reflects the perceptions of business people and country analysts of the degree to which corruption exists among politicians and public officials. The Berlin-based TI defines corruption as the “abuse of public office for private gain”.
The table below shows the ranking and scores of the EU-25 countries plus those of candidates Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia.
Rank Country CPI score
1 Finland 9.7
3 Denmark 9.5
6 Sweden 9.2
10 Netherlands 8.7
11 United Kingdom 8.6
13 Austria 8.4
13 Luxembourg 8.4
15 Germany 8.2
17 Belgium 7.5
17 Ireland 7.5
22 France 7.1
22 Spain 7.1
25 Malta 6.8
27 Portugal 6.3
31 Estonia 6.0
31 Slovenia 6.0
36 Cyprus 5.4
42 Hungary 4.8
42 Italy 4.8
44 Lithuania 4.6
49 Greece 4.3
51 Czech Republic 4.2
54 Bulgaria 4.1
57 Latvia 4.0
57 Slovakia 4.0
67 Croatia 3.5
67 Poland 3.5
77 Turkey 3.2
87 Romania 2.9