OECD Task force on tax and development
The OECD Task Force on Tax and Development held its Third Plenary meeting in Cape Town, South Africa on 9-10 May. The meeting was hosted by the South African Revenue Service and co-chaired by its Commissioner, Mr. Oupa G. Magashula and Jos van Leeuwen, the Netherlands representative. Participants were OECD and non OECD member-country representatives, as well as officials from international and regional organizations, civil society and the business sector. CIAT was represented by Socorro Velazquez, Director of Planning and Institutional Development.
Participants reported on several initiatives and the progress made since the previous meeting on 11-12 April 2011 and explored further ways to help developing countries better mobilize their domestic resources.
Several topics of great interest were addressed. Among those are:
1) The development and testing of the ‘Tax Inspectors Without Borders’ initiative. Within the framework of the Task Force, the OECD will develop this initiative to deploy the right experts at the right time in the right places, to help, for example, with complex international tax audits filling an important gap in the current provision of assistance.
2) The Task Force agreed that tax policy design is also key to better ensure the mobilization of domestic resources. In particular, addressing tax incentives is a key challenge in both OECD and non-OECD countries alike and the Task Force welcomed the OECD’s proposed new service to undertake tax and investment reviews.
3) The Task Force welcomed increased international cooperation in the area of Transfer Pricing including the support delivered to Colombia, Ghana, Kenya, Rwanda, and Vietnam by the joint OECD, EC, and World Bank program. The need for developing countries to better influence the setting of international tax standards, was fully acknowledged. As a mechanism to enable developing countries to feedback their experience on the applicability of OECD standards and guidelines, the Task Force noted the recently established Global Forum on Transfer Pricing and welcomed the development of a practical transfer pricing needs assessment tool to support developing countries.