How the world sees us - friendly but poor for sport and business

Published on Friday 17 December 2010 17:18

Scotland could be making more of its strong global identity to help boost economic growth, business leaders have warned.

The country is seen as having a strong and unique reputation, according to a new international index measuring nations' brand identity.

Scots are seen as welcoming and friendly by other countries - although its proud sporting heritage takes a knock with a low standing after recent World Cup qualifying failures.

The country has been ranked 13th out of 50 countries as a place to live and work, according to the Anholt GFKRoper's Nation Brands Index.

But it adds: "The idea of investing in business in Scotland did not register as strongly."

In this respect, Scotland ranked just 21st against the other countries, while its reputation for exports was among its lowest - at 23rd - on the index.

Garry Clark, head of policy at the Scottish Chambers of Commerce, said: "As a nation we do have a strong brand and it is something that we need to market better if we want to make the most of it.

"Clearly there's a recognised product there and people throughout the world view Scotland pretty positively.

"But if we're not getting the full potential in terms of the economic benefits then that's something that Scotland needs to work on."

Countries like Australia, Canada and Poland are in a better position now than they were at the start of the recession, he added.

• 'There are people who think we are a province of England or the UK'

"We need presences in these countries to maximise the opportunities for our businesses trading worldwide and also to attract inward investment as well which is globally important."

The survey was carried out among 1,000 people in each of 20 countries who were asked to rate 50 countries on the Nation Brand Index (NBI).

It aims to measure a country's reputation as a whole by setting out areas where performance is measured. These comprise exports, governance, culture, people and tourism, along with investment and immigration.

Overall Scotland has fallen one place from 14th to 15th in the reputation stakes, although the report states that it "continues to have a unique reputation abroad compared to nations of a similar size".

It also has a strong reputation for governance around the world at 14th in the index. It sits "several places" above the US, according to the index, but behind similar smaller nations like Finland, Denmark and New Zealand. "Five nations place Scotland in their top ten for governance - UK, Australia, US, Sweden and Canada," the report states.

Scotland's two biggest strengths here are around its role in global efforts towards the environment and its fair treatment of its people.

It does not perform so well in the index for sporting excellence, falling into the bottom half at 26th.Scotland's recent failure to qualify for finals of major global tournament like the World Cup Finals is behind this, according to the report, while most nations that perform well in this area compete as an Olympic Games team.

Scottish people are also seen as welcoming and friendly, with the nation ranked 11th in the index. The most commonly used words that people used to describe Scots were "hard working", "honest" and "skilful".

A Scottish Government spokesperson said: "The strength of Scotland's worldwide reputation and image is quite remarkable Despite not having the full constitutional status of a nation state, Scotland continues to score similarly, and often ahead of other small, high-income nations like Denmark, Finland and New Zealand.

"Online panellists continue to recognise Scotland for the natural beauty of our landscape, our rich cultural heritage, warm welcome and fairness."

The 50 countries who were involved in the survey spans the continents and include the US, Canada, Germany France, Russia, Poland, China, Brazil, Iran, Saudi Arabia and South Africa.

Nearly all of the countries which were surveyed ranked Scotland somewhere in 10th to 25th place among the 50 countries, with the notable exceptions of the UK (5th), US (8th) and Egypt (32nd).

Scotland's reputation is strong among its Western European neighbours, as well as in the US and Canada, two North American countries which have strong historic and genealogical ties back to Scotland.

However, moving further south into areas such as Mexico and Latin America, with the exception of Australia, Scotland's reputation begins to fade.

Similarly, its global standing begins to decline in Eastern Europe and Asia.

Scotland was unsurprisingly ranked as having the best reputation in the world by the country's own panel in the survey. All but China ranked its own nation as number one.