NEW YORK, Oct. 29 -- China outperforms most economies around the world on traditional drivers of development, ranked fourth globally and top among emerging market economies, a Bloomberg report said on Tuesday.

Rapid modernization of infrastructure, advances in education, investment in research and development and can-do government have delivered China four decades of stellar growth, said the report.

Launched by the Bloomberg New Economy Forum, the Drivers and Disrupters Report covers 114 economies, accounting for 98 percent of global GDP, based on two sets of metrics, namely the drivers and disrupters of development.

Sweden, Switzerland and Denmark are the top three countries in the drivers ranking, which consists of a composite gauge of productivity, as well as the projected growth in the labor force, the scale and quality of investment, and a measure of distance from the development frontier.

Bloomberg defines the New Economy as the shift in global economic power, from the traditional seats of power in Europe and North America to emerging economies spanning Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Latin America.

On the disrupters of development, China is faced with challenges brought about by protectionism and climate change, said Tom Orlik, chief economist at Bloomberg Economics and main contributor of the report.

The U.S.-initiated trade dispute has caused damage to global growth, costing around 1 percent of global GDP. It has also slowed down China's exports and the process of learning foreign technologies to catch up with higher-income countries.

"China did very well in finding efficient solutions to its own economic problems in the past three or four decades," said Orlik. "I'm sure that faced with the challenges of protectionism and climate change, China's policymakers will do equally well in finding the right solutions."

"One of the most striking things that we've seen in China in the last four-five years is a really ambitious move to open up the financial sector, the equity market and the bond market to foreign investors, and open up the ownership in banking, insurance and equity brokerage sectors to foreign firms," he added.

On climate change, China has already demonstrated that the fight against climate change also brings about business opportunities, with sustainable energy being one of them, said Orlik.