The Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD4) needs to address the issue of tax expenditures. These preferential tax treatments cause huge immediate public revenue losses while their effectiveness is often in doubt.
Governments worldwide use preferential tax treatments – called tax expenditures – to pursue different policy objectives, such as attracting investments, promoting employment, fighting poverty or curbing greenhouse gas emissions. (mehr …)
Traditionally strategies aimed at accelerating economic development in Africa have focused on strengthening domestic resource mobilization and attracting more external capital to fill the large financing gaps faced by the continent. Much less attention has been paid to the illicit export of Africa’s capital – capital flight. This approach has perpetuated Africa’s dependence on external financing while ‘normalizing’ the plunder of Africa’s wealth through unfair trade and illicit financial flows.