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Companies from Russia and China are most likely to pay bribes when doing
business abroad, a survey suggests.
The two scored worst out of 28 countries in a poll of 3,000 business executives
conducted by anti-corruption group Transparency International (TI).
The Netherlands and Switzerland came top, while the UK ranked eighth, just
ahead of the US and France.
Bribery was reportedly most common to win public sector works and construction
contracts.
'No integrity'
"It is of particular concern that China and Russia are at the bottom of the
index," said TI in its report.
"Given the increasing global presence of businesses from the countries, bribery
and corruption are likely to have a substantial impact on societies in which
they operate and on the ability of companies to compete fairly in these
markets."
Other major developing economies came much higher up the rankings. India was
19th, while Brazil, in 14th place, was one spot ahead of Italy.
The report called for more international action to outlaw companies from paying
bribes in foreign countries.
Bribe Rankings - worst offenders last
1. Netherlands, Switzerland
3. Belgium
4. Germany, Japan
6. Australia, Canada
8. Singapore, UK
10. US
11. France, Spain
13. South Korea
14. Brazil
15. Hong Kong, Italy, Malaysia, South Africa
19. India, Turkey
22. Saudi Arabia
23. Argentina, UAE
25. Indonesia
26. Mexico
27. China
28. Russia
"G20 governments must tackle foreign bribery as a matter of urgency," said
Huguette Labelle, chair of TI, who said that more resources must be dedicated
to investigations and prosecutions.
Russia, which came bottom of the league, was seen by TI as a particularly
challenging case.
"Unfortunately... there are no islands of integrity in Russian public and
business life," said TI Russian director, Elena Panfilova.
'Cheating taxpayers'
Survey respondents were asked to say how likely companies from each of the
foreign countries were to offer back-handers.
Bribe-paying was seen as much more common by businessmen from countries whose
governments were also considered to have the least integrity, according to a
separate "corruption perceptions" survey carried out by TI last year.
The sector most affected by bribery was public procurement - where companies
compete to win contracts from governments for everything from waste collection
to road building.
TI noted that the nature of public sector contracts - which are usually large,
complex and involve many sub-contractors - makes it much easier to inflate
costs and hide inappropriate payments.
However, TI said that paying bribes to win major infrastructure and housing
projects "effectively cheats taxpayers out of their money" and can undermine
safety standards.
The survey indicated that companies paid bribes almost as routinely to other
businesses as they do to government officials.
The mining and the oil and gas sectors - in which Russia and China are most
active - also scored low in the poll.
Agriculture was considered the least bribe-prone, while banking ranked the
fourth least-corrupt out of 19 industries.