“Tax Expenditure Implications for National Development” was the theme of Nigeria’s annual National Conference on Tax Expenditures.
At the conference, the Federal Ministry of Finance and Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) shed light on Nigeria’s current taxation landscape. Panel sessions discussed how to leverage tax incentives and coordination while identifying gaps impeding effective governance in this sector. Some barriers included data availability issues, insufficient cost-benefit analysis and limited reporting systems & capacity.
To ensure best fiscal practices all around, proposed recommendations included expanding tax expenditure evaluations beyond VAT and Import Duty while creating interagency platforms for coordination of such endeavours. Moreover, establishing an Exemption Monitoring and Control Unit in the Ministry of Finance would enable regular monitoring that could be used as valuable feedback loops.
Held on December 5-6, 2022 in Abuja, Nigeria, the event was organized by the Tax Justice and Governance Platform (TJ&GP).
As a member of the TJ&GP, International Budget Partnership contributed to the robustness of the conversation by sharing GIFT – Global Initiative for Fiscal Transparency‘s transparency principles which set the tone for the panel discussion on stakeholders coordination on Tax Expenditures (TE).
Government Ministries, Departments and Agencies that attended the conference included Federal Ministry of Finance Federal Ministry of Health Nigeria, Federal Inland Revenue Service – FIRS, Economic and Financial Crimes Commissionn, Fiscal Responsibility, Revenue Mobilization Allocation and Fiscal Commission, The Budget Office of the Federation, and Senate Committee on Customs.
Participants also hailed from professional associations including West African Tax Administration Forum, West African Tax Transition Support Programme (ECOWAS PATF), Chartered Institute of Taxation of Nigeria -CITN, Society of Women in Taxation (SWIT), and the Association of Nigerian Business Women Network. Civil society, the private sector, and the media also attended.
