Africa > Madagascar, Republic of

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Jean-François Wen
Turnover taxes are prevalent in developing countries as a simple form of presumptive taxation of business income. Such simplified tax regimes can reduce the relatively high compliance costs of micro and small enterprises, which might otherwise discourage entrepreneurs from formalizing their activities and paying taxes. The note addresses design issues for a turnover tax regime—which taxes it replaces, what the criteria are for eligibility, how to determine the optimal threshold, and how to set the tax rate. A key observation is that, although low turnover tax rates may incite larger firms to artificially reduce their sales, the rate should also not be so high as to discourage formalization of activities. A table of tax rates and turnover thresholds observed internationally is provided. The note concludes by suggesting analytical steps to guide practitioners in designing turnover tax regimes.
International Monetary Fund. African Dept.
En 2022, le PIB réel a dépassé son niveau antérieur à la pandémie. Cela étant, le repli de la demande émanant des partenaires commerciaux, les phénomènes météorologiques récents et le risque d’accentuation des tensions politiques à l’approche des élections présidentielles, prévues en novembre 2023, continueront de peser sur les perspectives en 2023. Le déficit budgétaire s’est creusé dernièrement, mais le règlement des dettes croisées avec les distributeurs de pétrole devrait améliorer le solde budgétaire en 2023 et réduire les risques budgétaires à l’avenir.
International Monetary Fund. African Dept.
This paper discusses Republic of Madagascar’s Fourth Review under the Extended Credit Facility Arrangement and Requests for a Waiver of Nonobservance of Performance Criteria and Modification of Performance Criteria. Madagascar’s growth has decelerated, and inflation remains high. Program performance remains mixed with a breach of the 2022 deficit target but progress on the structural reform agenda. The authorities have also adopted the necessary changes to the public procurement legal framework to allow for the collection and publication of ultimate beneficiary owner information and submitted a revised mining code in line with IMF staff recommendations to Parliament. The authorities are taking measures to adjust non-priority spending in the face of lower-than-expected revenue in 2023. It is proposed to relax the 2023 domestic primary deficit target to accommodate higher transfers to the electricity state-owned enterprises that reported record losses in 2022 and accumulated large arrears. Related modifications of other quantitative performance criteria are also proposed. Improvement in budget execution, transparency, and governance are critically needed to foster stronger and sustainable growth.
Mario Pessoa
,
Andrew Okello
,
Artur Swistak
,
Muyangwa Muyangwa
,
Virginia Alonso-Albarran
, and
Vincent de Paul Koukpaizan
The value-added tax (VAT) has the potential to generate significant government revenue. Despite its intrinsic self-enforcement capacity, many tax administrations find it challenging to refund excess input credits, which is critical to a well-functioning VAT system. Improperly functioning VAT refund practices can have profound implications for fiscal policy and management, including inaccurate deficit measurement, spending overruns, poor budget credibility, impaired treasury operations, and arrears accumulation.This note addresses the following issues: (1) What are VAT refunds and why should they be managed properly? (2) What practices should be put in place (in tax policy, tax administration, budget and treasury management, debt, and fiscal statistics) to help manage key aspects of VAT refunds? For a refund mechanism to be credible, the tax administration must ensure that it is equipped with the strategies, processes, and abilities needed to identify VAT refund fraud. It must also be prepared to act quickly to combat such fraud/schemes.
International Monetary Fund. African Dept.
This Selected Issues paper presents a study on poverty in Madagascar. Madagascar is a country with general, widespread, and increasing poverty. Most of the population is extremely poor and struggling to pay for food. Madagascar has the potential to grow rapidly. It is endowed with abundant natural resources, a unique wildlife, and a young, vibrant, and rapidly growing population. Taking full advantage of the young population will require higher investment in education and healthcare. Economic inequality appears to have declined and the poorest have in fact increased their consumption. Thus, while it is true that more people are poor today than in 2001, on average those who are deepest into poverty appear to be economically better off today than in 2001. Poverty is primarily a rural challenge. An overriding majority of the population lives in rural areas and rural poverty rates are almost double those of urban areas.
International Monetary Fund
This Selected Issues paper on the Republic of Madagascar reports on the several key themes associated with longer-term development issues in Madagascar. As one of the poorest countries in sub-Saharan Africa, Madagascar suffers from low levels of social indicators across all fronts including education, health, water and sanitation, and infrastructure. To make progress toward the Millennium Development Goals, the country will need to scale up substantially both public and private investment while taking actions to increase absorptive and institutional capacity and implementing supportive policies in each of the priority sectors.
International Monetary Fund
The staff report for the First Review Under the Three-Year Arrangement for the Republic of Madagascar reviews economic and financial policies. The 2007 economic program is designed to sustain growth, promote fiscal consolidation, and reduce poverty while keeping inflation to single digits and reducing the economy’s vulnerability to shocks. Central bank interventions will be limited to smoothing large variations in the exchange rate and meeting the program’s foreign reserve target. Planned spending reductions should offset any shortfall in revenues, which would allow the domestic financing target to be met.
International Monetary Fund
Madagascar showed strong economic growth and low inflation under the Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility (PRGF) Arrangement. Executive Directors commended these developments, and stressed the need to restore fiscal discipline, improve governance, strengthen the business climate to encourage private investment, and accelerate structural reforms. They welcomed the plan to privatize and rehabilitate the telecom, cotton, sugar, and utility companies, and agreed that Madagascar has successfully completed the fourth review under the PRGF program, and approved waiver, additional interim assistance, and an extension of the arrangement.
Mr. Arvind Subramanian
,
Aaditya Mattoo
, and
Mr. Devesh Roy
This paper describes the United States recently enacted Africa Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) and assesses its quantitative impact on African exports. The AGOA expands the scope of preferential access of Africa's exports to the United States in key areas such as clothing. However, its medium term benefits estimated at about US$100-$140 million, an 8 11 percent addition to current non-oil exports would have been nearly five times greater (US$540 million) if no restrictive conditions had been imposed on the terms of market access. The most important of these conditions are the rules of origin with which African exporters of clothing must comply to benefit from duty-free access.
International Monetary Fund
This Selected Issues paper and Statistical Appendix discusses initial performance and other issues relating to the implementation of the value-added tax in Mauritius in 1998. The paper highlights that as the Mauritius economy has continued to expand at a relatively rapid pace, the need for the monetary authorities to enhance their ability to influence domestic liquidity, as well as to ensure the integrity of the banking system, has become increasingly apparent. The paper also analyzes various issues in the banking sector of Mauritius.