Tax administration set to undergo major changes

FE Team | Published: June 23, 2007 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00

S M Jahangir
Major upgradation and modernisation of tax administration are in the offing to make the government's revenue collection process time-bound and effective.
The government in association with the World Bank will launch a programme styled "Revenue Administration Modernisation Project (RAMP)" shortly, official sources said.
"A process is underway to launch the RAMP in order to bring efficiency and dynamism in the entire tax administration," a senior National Board of Revenue (NBR) official said.
Negotiations regarding the funding arrangement for the proposed RARP with the WB are at the final stage, said the official.
The official further said: "If everything goes according to the plan, the proposed project will kick off within the next few months."
Earlier, the multilateral donor - WB -had assured the government of providing necessary funding support for the initiative, the NBR official said, but gave no details about how much fund could be available from the Bank.
Bringing about major structural changes in the tax administration, simplification of revenue collection procedures and development of human resources are high among the project agenda, the official mentioned.
The official also said the RAMP aims to build up the capacity of the revenue administrations through upgrading the skills of tax officials.
According to officials, all the wings -- Income Tax, Customs and Value Added Tax (VAT) -- along with the NBR itself will come under the proposed modernisation project.
They, however, said the proposed RARP will be a follow-up of the existing 'Modernisation and Automation Project', which was launched earlier for enhancing the administrative capacity of the NBR.
Pursued by major multilateral donors including the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Asian Development Bank (ADB), the government earlier undertook various reforms programmes for its tax administration.
The IMF had tagged the successful implementation of the government's revenue sector reforms with the disbursement of the Fund's support for the Poverty Reduction Growth Facility (PRGF) programme of Bangladesh, sources said.
The main objectives of such programmers were to boost the government's revenue collection through upgrading the capacity of the NBR, sources said.
Rationalisation of tariff structures, establishment of separate large taxpayers' units for VAT and income tax, setting up of central intelligence wing and creation of a central audit wing are among the major reforms done by the government, they added.
Meanwhile, the ADB is considering fresh funding supports for improvement of governance in the NBR along with some other important state agencies under the proposed project titled 'National Integrity Strategy'.