Starting a business or opening a branch office in Suriname requires compliance with various registration and approval guidelines depending on the legal structure of the company. All businesses must register with the Suriname Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KKF). According to the World Bank Ease of Doing Business Report, starting a business takes, on average, 66 days. The local chamber reports that it takes less than 30 days.
Businesses in 26 sectors must obtain a business license from the Business Licenses Department at the Ministry of Economic Affairs. The waiting time from application to approval is three months. On average, business licenses are issued approximately 21 days after approval.
Suriname is a member of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and has signed various international intellectual property rights (IPR) treaties but their requirements and enforcement mechanisms have not yet been fully integrated into the country’s legislation. IPR legislation grants protection for patents, copyrights, and trademarks. No protection is provided for industrial designs, utility models, geographical indications, layout-designs of integrated circuits, or undisclosed information.
The government procurement process is not fully up to international standards. To some extent, this is because there is no stand-alone law on procurement, but also because the present rules allow for numerous exceptions. Tenders financed by multilateral banks are published in the newspapers and on the banks’ websites.