The United States remains the most competitive country in the world, according to an annual report released on Wednesday.

The Geneva-based World Economic Forum's Global Competitiveness Report ranks 134 countries in terms of their business environment.

The rankings are calculated from available public data and a survey conducted by the World Economic Forum. More than 12,000 businesses in the 134 countries were polled in creating the report.

According to the report, the United States has many structural features that make its economy extremely productive, including innovation, a high-quality university system and a flexible labour market, though it also notes that large deficits held by the country could threaten its No. 1 spot in the future.

The data for the 2008-09 report was collected before the continuing global financial crisis hit.

Canada has moved up three places from its 13th rank in 2007-08 to the 10th position.

Jennifer Blanke, one of the report's authors, said Canada got high marks for its institutions and innovative environment but the country's macroeconomic environment is problematic.

"Canada continues to have quite a high level of debt," Blanke said. "For example, just the interest payments on the debt continue to be worrisome going into the future in terms of being able to prepare for … a large number of people reaching retirement."

Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden and Singapore placed second, third, fourth and fifth, respectively, in the poll.

Finland came sixth in the poll, while Germany slipped two places to seventh because of worsening business confidence in Europe's biggest economy.

The Netherlands and Japan rounded off the top 10.

China moves up to No. 30

The report indicated the United Kingdom slipped down three spaces from its 2007 ranking in the ninth spot to the 12th nation on the list because of growing public debt and low national savings compared with other major economies.

Though Singapore was the highest ranked Asian country, China is catching up and moved up four positions from the previous year to the 30th spot.

India came 50th followed by Russia in the 51st spot.

Countries in sub-Saharan Africa ranked as the least competitive in the world, according to the report.

The report is meant to identify key factors of economic growth as a way to determine why some countries are more successful than others.

Areas that are examined include:

• Institutions.
• Infrastructure.
• Macroeconomic stability.
• Health and primary education.
• Higher education and training.
• Technological readiness.
• Market size.
• Innovation.
• Business.

"In the context of the current crisis, the index rather measures the ability of economies to limit the impact of the shock waves on the real economy and to bounce back quickly based on sound economic fundamentals," said Margareta Drzeniek-Hanouz, one of the authors of the report.

"As the crisis spills over into the real economy, we may see a weakening of the assessment in some categories over the next year or two, in particular with respect to macroeconomic stability or public institutions, but this remains to be seen," she added.

In times of global financial uncertainty, it is even more important for countries to put into place the fundamentals needed for economic growth and development, said Klaus Schwab, executive chairman of the World Economic Forum.

With files from Reuters