Report on tax policy which strenthen the role of the price mechanism in allocating resources, based on the existing tax structures of the countries of Sub-Saharan Africa.

Trade is an essential driver for sustained economic growth, and growth is necessary for poverty reduction. In Sub-Saharan Africa, where three-fourths of the poor live in rural areas, spurring growth and generating income and employment opportunities is critical for poverty reduction strategies. Seventy percent of the population lives in rural areas, where livelihoods are largely dependent on the production and export of raw agricultural commodities such as coffee, cocoa, and cotton, whose prices in real terms have been steadily declining over the past decades. The deterioration in the terms of trade resulted for Africa in a steady contraction of its share in global trade over the past 50 years. Diversification of agriculture into higher-value, non-traditional exports is seen today as a priority for most of these countries. Some African countries-in particular, Kenya, South Africa, Uganda, CÔte d'Ivoire, Senegal, and Zimbabwe-have managed to diversify their agricultural sector into non-traditional, high-value-added products such as cut flowers and plants, fresh and processed fruits and vegetables. To learn from these experiences and better assist other African countries in designing and implementing effective agricultural growth and diversification strategies, the World Bank has launched a comprehensive set of studies under the broad theme of "Agricultural Trade Facilitation and Non-Traditional Agricultural Export Development in Sub-Saharan Africa." This study provides an in-depth analysis of the current structure and dynamics of the European import market for flowers and fresh horticulture products. It aims to help client countries, industry stakeholders, and development partners to get a better understanding of these markets, and to assess the prospects and opportunities they offer for Sub-Saharan African exporters.

This paper studies tax policies as currently pursued in a number of sub-Saharan African countries, against the backdrop of economic globalisation and reduced trade tax revenue. It tries to come up with answers to the following question: what are most effective and (economically) efficient ways to raise sufficient domestic (tax) revenues? To analyse this, first, a normative framework for the major individual domestic tax interventions - broad based and specific taxation of consumption and taxation of income, both at the personal and the corporate level - has been developed, based on a thorough review of the literature. This framework is subsequently used to assess the tax systems as found in fifteen sub-Saharan African countries. The analysis shows that there is much room for improvement in VAT systems (thresholds may be higher, the number of exemptions may be decreased) in corporate income tax systems (ending exemptions, streamlining depreciation allowances, aligning rates, scaling back tax incentives) as well as in excises and personal income tax systems. These improvements will enable raising more revenue, as well as a more efficient collection of taxes.

Overreliance on production sharing and resource rent taxes can expose small, open economies that are neither diversified nor wealthy to unacceptable risks and fluctuations in revenue.

This paper investigates the costs and benefits of concluding double tax treaties with investment hubs. Based on a sample of 41 African economies from 1985–2015, the results suggest that signing treaties with investment hubs is not associated with additional investments; yet, these treaties tend to come with nonnegligible revenue losses. Building on a theoretical model, the paper investigates the role of treaty shopping in driving nominal investment flows and provides indirect evidence for its importance in the sample

An analysis of data for 39 sub-Saharan African countries during 1985–96 indicates that the variations in tax revenue-GDP ratios within this group are influenced by economic policies and the level of corruption. Namely, these ratios rise with declining inflation, implementation of structural reforms, rising human capital (a proxy for the provision of public services by the government), and declining corruption. The paper confirms that the tax revenue ratio rises with income, and that elements of a country’s tax base (such as the share of agriculture in GDP and the degree of openness) influence tax revenue.