The Internal Revenue Service of Ecuador together with the Inter-American Center of Tax Administrations successfully carried out an International Seminar on “Taxation as a solidarity contribution” from 2-3, May 2012, in Quito, Ecuador.

The seminar was attended by 125 participants from international delegations such as Paraguay, Chile, Spain; and national delegations such as ministries, academic members of the country, besides officials of the Internal Revenue Service.

The event was opened with the words of the CIAT International Cooperation Coordinator, the Director of the Fiscal Studies Center of Ecuador, and the Director of the Internal Revenue Service of Ecuador, Econ. Carlos Marx Carrasco who highlighted the key challenges of the tax administrations to transform the vision of taxation as a “tax burden” into an efficient tool for social equity, so that it becomes a key element of a new way to manage taxes according to the institutional philosophy.

The seminar counted on the distinguished participation of international panelists, from the University of Huelva, Dr. Antonio Hidalgo Capitan, from the Carlos III University of Madrid, Dr. Santiago Diaz de Sarralde; and Dr. Lucy Winchester from the Economic Commission for Latin America. It is also worth mentioning the outstanding presentation of the National Secretary for Planning of Ecuador, Dr. Fander Falconi, as well as those of Dr. Manolo Rhodes Beltran, National Director of the Legal Department of the IRS, and Mr. Lenin Mario Solis and Econ. Nicolas Oliva Perez from the Fiscal Studies Center of Ecuador.

This seminar was characterized for being a high-level academic event dealing with relevant issues such as visions for the development, direct, progressive, redistributive and efficient taxation; ideology of the legal discourse; how to measure the efficiency of investment and public expenditure with the budget by results?; alternatives for the construction of fiscal citizenship and environmental taxation.