International Centre for Tax and Development

Lower-income countries (LICs) have an ambivalent relationship with international tax standards.

⚖️ On the one hand, adopting them allows countries to draw on models, tools, and experience developed over decades by the global North. On the other hand, such standards have not historically been developed with LICs’ interests, priorities, and capabilities in mind.

So how do LICs navigate them in practice?

🌍 In a new ICTD research project, entitled ‘Comparative Perspectives on International Tax from the Global South’, we collaborated with local researchers in Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Pakistan, Peru, Uganda, and Zambia to investigate how these countries are implementing standards on:

✅ exchange of information
✅ transfer pricing
✅tax treaties
✅ digital services taxation

Today, we are launching the first in a series of studies, focusing on Zambia. International tax law specialist Kennedy Munyandi, LL.M. finds that the country has been slow to adopt and implement these standards.

🟢 He attributes this pattern to limited awareness of their revenue potential, technical capacity constraints, burdensome bureaucratic processes, and the absence of a coherent national policy framework for international taxation.

The findings also flag a specific gap in judicial capacity: both the Tax Appeals Tribunal and the higher courts face significant challenges handling international tax matters, particularly transfer pricing disputes.

Read the full findings here ➡️ https://ow.ly/OmWR50Z8TRb

📸africa924/iStock

If a country receives offshore financial data from other governments, does it actually have the tools to use it?

📝 A new ICTD paper examines this question through Nigeria's experience implementing the Common Reporting Standard (CRS). The research finds that while CRS-based audits have generated measurable additional revenue, use of that data is uneven -- information on individuals and small businesses remains largely unused due to capacity constraints at the state level.

🟢 The core finding: access to offshore information is necessary, but not sufficient. What matters is the institutional capacity to turn that data into real enforcement.

Read the full findings here ➡️ https://ow.ly/T3g050Z5CFf

Short on time? Check out the 2-page summary below ⬇️

When Ian Kananura (2018/19 alum of ICTD’s Research on Tax and Development course) first began his career in real estate financing and construction, he did not imagine his work would eventually lead him into cryptocurrency taxation, artificial intelligence, and tax policy reform.

We sat down with Ian to ask him about his career journey, the growing importance of research-informed tax policy, and why domestic revenue mobilisation will be central to Africa’s future.

🔗Read his story here: https://ow.ly/nHUS50Z64QT

From real estate to crypto in Uganda: navigating tax policy in a changing world - ICTD Ian Kananura Mwesigye reflects on his career in Uganda and the growing importance of research-informed tax policy for Africa’s future.

Last month, we launched a national taxpayer compliance survey in Eswatini, in close partnership with the Eswatini Revenue Service (ERS), aimed at building a clearer picture of taxpayer behaviour, compliance costs, and perceptions of the tax system.

🤝 The study builds on a long-standing collaboration between ICTD and the ERS, which began in 2019 with a previous joint taxpayer survey, and have since covered a range of research related to tax administration, taxpayer communication, digital filing systems, and payment methods, among others.

Researcher Celeste Scarpini, who leads on the survey on behalf of ICTD, said the work responds to the ERS's interest in updating and expanding the evidence base on taxpayer experiences.

💻 Meanwhile, "on a personal level, I want to better understand the costs borne by taxpayers when digitsation policies mandate the exclusive use of digital tools, and are implemented at a very rapid pace," she said.

Read more about the survey and our partnership here 👇
https://ow.ly/vIb550Z53Ff

📸Eswatini Revenue Service

Check your emails 📬

The May edition of ICTD Insights has now landed! Here we recap our latest research and analyses on all things tax and development -- from how to get tax reform right amidst financial pressures, to the implementation of EOI standards, to using digital tools to increase tax compliance.

Plus, we bring you the latest news on our work with partners in Eswatini, as well as updates from our teaching and learning alumni! 👇
https://ow.ly/XzzK50Z65Eo

Don't miss the next one -- subscribe now ➡️ https://ow.ly/40Sn50QxVQI

Did you know that to***co taxes are one of the most underused revenue tools in many lower-income countries? Industry lobbying and unsubstantiated economic claims often get in the way of good tax policy. 🚬

ICTD brings independent, evidence-based research to these debates -- helping policymakers across Africa and beyond understand the real fiscal and economic case for to***co tax reform.

Take a look at our work 👉https://ow.ly/pSpO50Z53gk

Explore our work on to***co taxation Increasing taxes on to***co is the most effective way to curb consumption while also raising government revenue.

📸 Last week, our founder, Mick Moore, joined friends and collaborators at Chr. Michelsen Institute (CMI) to celebrate Odd-Helge Fjeldstad and his long contribution to tax research, including during his time as a senior research fellow at ICTD.

Throughout the day of lectures, discussions, and reflections, participants highlighted Fjeldstad's impact on both scholarship and practice.

🤝 One of the strongest messages from the symposium was that tax is about more than revenue collection: it is also about fairness, trust, and the relationship between citizens and the state -- an issue at the core of Fjeldstad's work.

At last week’s Global Partnerships Conference, experts and representatives from government and civil society argued that the future of development increasingly depends on getting tax right, at a side event organised by ICTD and TaxDev.

Our event provided practical, evidence-based lessons on how lower-income countries can transition towards more self-determined development models through domestic revenue mobilisation.

The discussion also echoed commitments made in the conference Compact, which pledged to “back reforms that strengthen tax systems […] and that tackle illicit financial flows”.

Throughout the session, Vishal Gujadhur (Gates Foundation) returned to a central question: how can countries build tax systems that are not only more effective, but also more equitable and politically sustainable?

💬Here is what our panellists had to say ⬇️

🟢Giulia Mascagni (ICTD) argued that while scaling up capacity is vital, the way governments raise revenue determines its success:
“We are in a really good position in the sense that we know what works and what doesn’t. We have a lot of evidence on that. But it’s important to confront the fact that this is going to take time, and it remains a shared responsibility."

🟢Illustrating the importance of long-term, demand-driven collaboration, Yani Tyskerud ( | ODI) shared how partnerships have contributed to concrete policy reforms:
“Working closely with analysts from the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning and the Rwanda Revenue Authority, we modelled a range of different options to support detailed discussion about both the revenue and the equity impacts of potential reforms."

🟢In Sierra Leone, Alimamy Bangura, Chief Economist at the Ministry of Finance, Sierra Leone, explained how his country leveraged research to increase revenue collection:
“We worked with ICTD to develop data-matching tools to identify high-capacity taxpayers — wealthy professionals such as lawyers, doctors and engineers — who were previously out of the tax net.”

🟢But debates on tax reform cannot be separated from the broader question of public spending and debt, said Jason Rosario Braganza:
“Are we understanding what that tax is being used for? Is it developmental in nature? Is it actually contributing to the productive capacity that taxation and tax revenue collection should support?”

Another important theme of the discussion is the role of tax expenditures — including exemptions, deductions, and preferential tax rates — in weakening government revenues which Alexandra Readhead (International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD)) addressed in her talking head segment on behalf of the Coalition on Tax Expenditure (COATE).

🔗Read the full story: https://shorturl.at/rADPN

Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office | South African Government | Children's Investment Fund Foundation

Earlier this month, ICTD Research Fellow Fabrizio Santoro joined the plenary session “Connected Government: Making Systems Talk” at the GovTech 4 Impact World Congress in Madrid 🌐

Drawing on ICTD’s research on digital transformation in tax administration in low- and middle-income countries, Fabrizio reflected on the opportunities and challenges of interoperability, digital ID integration, and data exchange in strengthening public administration.

“One of the key takeaways from the discussion was that expanding tax registration through system integration alone does not automatically lead to higher compliance or revenue gains. What matters is the administrative strategy and institutional vision behind a specific initiative.”

The session brought together speakers from across government, international organisations, and the digital governance space to discuss how connected systems can support more effective and responsive public services.