Korea went up three notches to 40th out of 180 countries in a global anti-corruption index, Transparency International said.

The German-based non-governmental agency, released the annual Corruption Perceptions Index, in which Korea scored 5.6, 0.5 point up from the previous year. The index scores are out of 10, with zero being the most corrupt.

The country"s score this year is the highest since the TI released its first annual index in 1995.

"The increased score for South Korea reflects the international community"s perception of improved public-sector ethics and a commitment to implementing anti-corruption measures," TI said in a press release.

Transparency International"s Korean branch noted Korea"s recent efforts in the public sector.

"It appears that the international community highly rated Korea"s efforts to establish a governance system for corruption prevention by setting up the Korean Pact on Anti-corruption and Transparency in 2005, and secure transparency in the arms trade through the establishment of the Defense Acquisition Program Administration in 2006," said Kang Sung-goo, secretary-general of the TI"s Korean office.

The index, published annually, shows the degree of a country to which corruption is perceived to exist among public officials and politicians, based on expert and business surveys.

In the 2008 survey, Denmark, New Zealand and Sweden marked the highest score at 9.3 each, followed by Singapore at 9.2. Somalia scored the lowest 1.0, immediately trailing Myanmar and Iraq at 1.3 and Haiti at 1.4.

Korea has shown a steady improvement in its anti-corruption endeavors. The country"s score in 1995 was at 4.29 in the survey of 41 countries, which rose to 5.6 in the survey of 180 countries after having recorded the lowest score of 3.8 among 99 nations in 1999.

The chief of the Korea"s national anti-corruption watchdog vowed to continue to carry out measures to stamp out corruption in various sectors of the society.

"Corruption is highly resilient. So, when the intensity of anti-corruption efforts decreases, corruption cases would soon emerge again," said Yang Kun, chairman of the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission.

"A spring cannot get back to its original state when it gets stretched beyond its elasticity limit. Likewise, if we significantly lower the corruption level in our society, we can expect many corruption cases will not arise again."

Experts underscored that the improvement in a country"s corruption level would eventually lead to economic benefits.

"Evidence suggests that an improvement in the CPI by one point on a 10-point-scale increases capital inflow by 0.5 percent of a country"s gross domestic product, and average income by as much as 4 percent," said Professor Johann Graf Lambsdorff of the University of Passau. Lambsdorff carries out the Index for TI.

Despite such improvements, Korea"s score is far from satisfactory, given its standing as the world"s 13th largest economy.

The average score for the 30 member nations of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development was 7.11, and most of the word"s advanced countries scored above seven. Korea ranked 22nd in the OECD.

Among Asian countries, Korea ranked fifth, behind Singapore (9.2), Hong Kong (8.1), Japan (7.3) and Taiwan (5.7) in the corruption perception index.

The ACRC has thus far made various efforts to reduce corruption.

The ACRC has sought to improve the nation"s institutions cited as problematic by foreign entrepreneurs participating in the evaluation.

In politics, the ACRC sought to secure transparency in securing and managing political funds. For instance, it has been pushing for a real-name system for offering political funds.

The commission also sought to remove irregularities in the customs clearance process, and secure transparency in the distribution of medicine products and in the nation"s telecommunications business deals.

The commission has made a host of recommendations to rectify unnecessary government regulations, which it cited as a key hurdle to revitalizing the economy. It especially focused on ones that could be arbitrarily interpreted and exploited, and eventually lead to corrupt acts.

The watchdog also focused on unrealistic and excessive government regulations - which hamper free industrial competition and unduly restrict citizens" lives - and on the ones that are so broad in scope that those in authority may abuse them, leading to corruption.

The ACRC has also helped various government agencies identify and eliminate corruption. It also worked with some countries in the Asia-Pacific region, including Indonesia and the Kingdom of Bhutan.

The ACRC was launched in February 2008 after combining three government committees--the Ombudsman of Korea, the Korea Independent Commission Against Corruption and the Administrative Appeals Commission.

Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission
Chairman Yang Kun

(Contribution to the Korea Herald)