Revenue challenges and opportunities in Africa following the COVID-19 pandemic

The uneven roll-out of vaccines around the world means that the health and economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic are likely to be particularly challenging for low-and middle-income countries, including those in Africa, over the next 18 months.

A number of these countries were already facing increasing debt prior to the pandemic, and high borrowing and debt servicing costs has limited their ability to borrow in order to tackle the pandemic and support their economies. This difficult fiscal context means it is more important than ever to consider both the challenges and opportunities in relation to tax policy.

At this event, researchers from TaxDev presented work which considered the fiscal and tax policy challenges and opportunities facing countries in Africa, focusing on the overall fiscal outlook, motor taxation, property taxation and reform of the global corporate income tax system.

There were four short presentations focusing on:

• The scale of the fiscal adjustments that may be needed, and the broad issues and options in designing and implementing such adjustments, presented by Ross Warwick.
• The principles and practice of motoring taxation, including the opportunities to better meet environmental and resource-mobilisation objectives, presented by Vedanth Nair.
• The potential opportunities and challenges from proposed changes to the global corporate income tax system, presented by Iain Steel.
• The lessons that can be learned from reforms to property taxes in Mexico that affected both tax rates and enforcement, presented by Anne Brockmeyer.

The event concluded with a panel discussion where policymakers and experts from TaxDev’s partner countries gave their views on the issues raised in the presentations, and reflected on the other revenue challenges and opportunities they face. 

The panellists were:

• Daniel Nuer, Head of the Tax Policy Unit - Ministry of Finance, Ghana
• Denis Mukama, Acting Deputy Commissioner of Research and Planning - Rwanda Revenue Authority, Rwanda
• Wollela Yesegat, Assistant Professor of Taxation - College of Business and Economics, Addis Ababa University

The event was chaired by Hazel Granger.

You can watch the full video of the event below.