Guyana’s lone revenue collection agency, the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) has again expressed worry with the rising level of non compliance among Guyanese tax payers.
GRA Chairman Rawle Lucas said the high level of tax non compliance in Guyana is a sad reality and promised changes within the revenue collection entity to deal with this trend.
“The numbers of persons paying taxes are declining but we will look to reverse the troubling trend,” Lucas told media operatives during a recent engagement.
“Revenue leaks through all of our tax structures but the ones that concern us most are those lost through self employed income taxes, property taxes, Value Added Taxes and Import Duties,” he added.
The GRA Chairman said what is also worrying for the agency is the relationship between the total number of registered tax payers and those paying taxes, adding that “revenue is needed so that government can perform its roles. As tax payers we are all asked to make a contribution through the tax system to the defence of our democracy and to create a livable environment”.
He said since his appointment as Chairman, the Board has examined economic data, spanning the period 2006 to 2014 to establish some preliminary estimates of the tax base.
“I have to ask how Guyanese continue to spend so much with so little money. We looked in the areas of borrowing and remittances from abroad and foreign aid and we cannot fully reconcile the spending taking place with the recorded revenue, even after making room for unsold inventory,” he lamented.
The Chairman said as it is, the current tax base was ill defined and distorted but noted that the aim of the GRA this year is to gain a more accurate estimate of the country’s tax base.
“An inaccurate tax base leads to revenue losses,” Lucas lamented.
He said the agency has begun to disaggregate the tax data by important economic hubs and have come across information that is both of interest and concern. The work done so far excludes Georgetown, which is by far most important, but it covers Anna Regina, Bartica, Corriverton Lethem, Linden, New Amsterdam Ogle and Parika.
These areas all together have been found to be contributing 2% to the overall revenue collection in the country.
“Another surprise to the agency was that an area like Corriverton in Region Six would be making a larger contribution to revenue than the current $1.3 billion and more than Linden which brings in $1.1 billion on a much narrower economic base,” the Chairman explained.
He said the GRA is also worried that Anna Regina and Bartica cannot do better in terms of revenue collection than the relatively depressed area of New Amsterdam. The GRA said the disbanding of the Berbice Anti – Smuggling Squad (BASS) was not seen as a contributor to these worrying figures.
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