Ministry Reports Collection of over 160 Billion Birr Tax Revenue

Addis Ababa June 5/2019 Over 160 billion birr tax revenue was collected during the 2018/19 Ethiopian fiscal year which started July 8, 2018,Ministry of Finance reported today.

Presenting the ten-month performance report of the ministry to the House of People's Representatives (HPR), Finance Minister Ahmed Shide said the 160.4 billion birr tax revenue is about 68 percent of the plan for the fiscal year.

According to him, the nation's tax collection status has improved following the recent reform and restructuring of tax collection system.

However, the amount of revenue has not still shown a significant progress, Ahmed noted, adding that the Ministry of Finance has established a task force of ministries dedicated to facilitating the country’s taxation activities.   

The minister revealed that the task force would enable the country to collect from 20 to 30 billion birr extra revenue by improving the tax management system in the country in the future.

Similarly, the country has secured 31.7 billion birr in foreign direct budget subsidy and this is a commendable achievement as the country has attained 164 percent of the plan during the budget year, Ahmed pointed out.

Responding to the question posed by the MPs with regard to the high inflation rate that has reached 12.6 percent and drastically affecting the macro-economy balance, the minister stated that the situation could have been worse had the government not pursued a strong fiscal and monitoring policy.

Noting that the inflation rate is the indication of the country’s macro economy imbalance, particularly the supply and the demand disparity, Ahmed mentioned the contributing factors to the inflation included low export performance, lack of appropriate finance model, and low tax revenue.