The Director General of Taxes chaired the fourth high-level meeting of the Asia Initiatives in New Delhi, India on 27-28 April 2023. This high-level meeting is a meeting between leaders of tax authorities in the Asian region who are members of the Asia Initiatives. The meeting was attended by 51 delegates consisting of representatives from 14 jurisdictions from the Asia Initiatives’ members, 4 international partner organizations, the Co-Chair of the Africa Initiatives, and leaders of the Global Forum on Tax Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes (Global Forum). In the meeting, Suryo Utomo, the Director General of Taxes acted as co-chair of the meeting together with Sanjay Malhotra, Revenue Secretary of India.
In his opening remarks, the Director General of Taxes asserted that tax transparency and exchange of information provide jurisdictions with essential tools of combatting tax evasion and other illicit financial flows. Furthermore, he also emphasized that the efforts to fight against tax evasion and other illicit financial flows cannot be done by countries individually, but should be done through multilateral cooperation among countries.
During the 2-day meeting, several activities were discussed to implement baseline actions and complementary actions to endorse tax transparency as well as exchange of information in the Asia region. The activities, among others are the wider use of exchange of information, assistance in tax recovery, and the use of exchange of information for Value Added Tax/Goods and Services Tax purposes. In addition, the delegates also held discussions and shared experiences regarding the efforts that Asian region countries could take to get more benefits from exchange of information, especially on data obtained through the automatic exchange of information (AEOI) on financial account information. Furthermore, the delegates agreed to establish a working group as an effort to increase the effective use of data received by the tax authorities through the AEOI on financial account information.
In the meeting, Tax Transparency in Asia 2023: Asia Initiative Progress Report was launched by the Global Forum (https://www.oecd.org/tax/transparency/documents/tax-transparency-in-asia-2023.htm). This document is the first to report developments of tax transparency in Asia during the period of 2009 to 2022. The report states that Asian countries lost around USD 3 trillion due to tax evasion and other illicit financial flows between 2004-2013. Further, it is estimated that there are around EUR 1.2 trillion of Asian wealth kept offshore, corresponding to a potential revenue loss of around EUR 25 billion per year by Asian countries. However, some remarkable results have been achieved by Asian jurisdictions. For example, jurisdictions joining the Global Forum on Tax Transparency and Exchange of Information has been doubled from 11 in 2009 to 22 in 2022. Jurisdictions also received additional revenue of more than EUR 20.1 billion since 2009 as a result of the implementation of exchange of information.
Apart from the main agenda, there was also a ceremonial announcement to formally welcome the Philippines as the 17th member of the Asia Initiatives. To formally join Asia Initiatives, a jurisdiction must submit the original copy of Bali Declaration signed by their respective finance minister. the original signed copy of the Bali Declaration from the Philippines was presented to Suryo Utomo as the Co-Chair of Asia Iniatives by Dakila Elteen Merecido Napao, Under Secretary (Vice Minister), Ministry of Finance of the Philippines.
Asia Initiatives is a framework of regional co-operation in the Asia to promote the implementation of tax transparency and exchange of information based on international standard. Asia Initiatives was launched in November 2021 at the Plenary Meeting of the Global Forum, which was then officially declared on 14 July 2022 through the signing of the Bali Declaration by 13 Asian Finance Ministers. To date, 17 jurisdictions have joined Asia Initiatives: Indonesia, Armenia, Brunei Darussalam, the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong (China), India, Japan, Kazakhstan, South Korea, Macau (China), Malaysia, Maldives, Mongolia, Pakistan, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. In 2023, Asia Initiatives is jointly led by Suryo Utomo, Director General of Taxes from Indonesia and Sanjay Malhotra, Revenue Secretary from India.
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